Welcome to the Monkey House by Kurt Vonnegut

 

A collection of short stories, mostly from the 1950s into the early 1960s (*Slaughterhouse-Five* was published in 1969, so at least most of these would have been before he broke big (ish). Some of them are, of course, better than others--it was a pleasure to renew my acquaintance with "Harrison Bergeron," others did much less--but Vonnegut is always Vonnegut, his voice and his concerns and his viewpoints remain clear throughout the lot of them, in all their various absurdities (and even the most mundane of them are at heart absurd). I should probably read more Vonnegut as I come across him.