Some critics have dismissed Cat's Cradle as a thin summation of the three books preceding it, but technically the novel marks some significant changes for Vonnegut. The fragmentary effect of 127 chapters, short units of prose often structured as three-line jokes, marked the beginning of Vonnegut's subsequent method.

It is also a book marked by irony.

The book is cautionary, even prophetic, but it also makes fun of prophets. In keeping with its warning to beware of the ascendancy of lies, the novel ends with the statement the "Nothing in this book is true."