When Kurt Vonnegut was my teacher, and the first reader of my first novel, he was writing Slaughterhouse-Five. Susan Farrell perceptively illuminates Kurt's arduous rewriting of his POW experience as fiction; she also brings to light the enduring effect of this courageous novel on Vonnegut's literary reputation and the rest of his life. First my mentor, later my dear friend, Kurt's life and fiction were forever affected by the Allied bombing of Dresden, which Susan Farrell has admirably and comprehensively depicted.

John Irving

Susan Farrell writes with warmth and style. Her penetrating study of Kurt Vonnegut's life and work uncovers facets that freshly illuminate a much-read novel we thought we knew. With one keen insight after another, Farrell shows why Slaughterhouse-Five was a novel for its time, how it made its tumultuous, icon-smashing and self-questioning time, and why it remains a novel for our time.

Ken Kalfus

Farrell writes the defining historiography of SL5, answering the question,“How the hell did Vonnegut do that?” by sequencing its well archived drafts before contextualizing his narrative choices. And that's just the half of it. Farrell addresses SL5's principle defining discussions including its metafictional elements, the questioned morality of Dresden's bombing, its adoption as a valued tome among Vietnam protestors, Vonnegut's science fiction albatross, and the novel's importance in court history as a frequent target for censorship.

Marc Leeds, Author of The Vonnegut Encyclopedia,

This book is superb. It's a unique, fresh, deep dive into how Slaughterhouse Five, Kurt Vonnegut's seminal work, came about. It's also a damn good read: Concise, substantial, entertaining, surprising.

Suzanne McConnell, author of 'Pity the Reader: On Writing with Style' by Kurt Vonnegut and Suzanne McConnell