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Title details for The Brothers Vonnegut by Ginger Strand - Available

The Brothers Vonnegut

Science and Fiction of the House of Magic

by Ginger Strand
Sean Runnette
Audiobook
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Worlds collide in this true story of weather control in the cold war era and the making of Kurt Vonnegut. In the mid-1950s, Kurt Vonnegut takes a job in the PR department at General Electric in Schenectady, where his older brother, Bernard, is a leading scientist in its research lab or House of Magic. Kurt has ambitions as a novelist, and Bernard is working on a series of cutting-edge weather-control experiments meant to make deserts bloom and farmers flourish. While Kurt writes zippy press releases, Bernard builds silver-iodide generators and attacks clouds with dry ice. His experiments attract the attention of the government; weather proved and decisive factor in World War II, and if the military can control the clouds, fog, and snow, they can fly more bombing missions. Maybe weather will even be – as a headline in America Magazine calls it. The New Super Weapon. But when the army takes charge of his cloudseeding project (dubbed Project Cirrus), Bernard begins to have misgivings about the use of his inventions for harm, not to mention the evidence that they are causing alarming changes in the atmosphere. In a fascinating cultural history, Ginger Strand chronicles the intersection of these brothers' lives at a time when the possibilities of science seemed infinite. As the Cold War looms, Bernards struggle for integrity plays out in Kurts evolving writing style. The Brothers Vonnegut reveals how science ability to influence the natural world also influenced one of out most incentive novelists.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    November 17, 2015

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781622319176
      • File size: 305973 KB
      • Duration: 10:37:26

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Most readers have heard of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., best known for his novel SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE. But few know even the name of his older brother, Bernard, a scientist who is credited with developing the process for using iodide crystals to seed clouds for rain. This work portrays both their lives in parallel chronologies. Sean Runnette delivers a solid, engaging narration. His conversational tone makes listening smooth and easy to follow. For example, when the author jumps abruptly from one brother to the other or even to a third person, Runnette pauses appropriately, allowing the listener to mentally make the shift. He sets off the few direct quotations with pauses, as well, again offering helpful aural cues. R.C.G. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      September 28, 2015
      What are the human consequences of invention? This question underlies Strand’s (Killer on the Road) account of the early life and turbulent times of Kurt Vonnegut and his brother, Bernard, a chemist. After tracing their childhood in an intellectual and pacifist Midwestern family and Kurt’s trauma as a POW who survived the firebombing of Dresden, Strand focuses on the brothers’ shared post-WWII experience working for General Electric. Bernie delights in high-profile weather modification research led by celebrity scientist Irving Langmuir. Kurt grinds at his publicist day job while struggling to establish himself as a writer. Strand recounts Kurt’s dismay as the world polarizes and scientific discoveries—even Bernie’s weather research—are co-opted by an increasingly grim and assertive military-industrial complex. The book goes on to show how Kurt reworked his GE experience, his brother’s research, and the figure of Langmuir in short stories and novels such as Player Piano and Cat’s Cradle that examined “progress and the dark side of it no one wanted to discuss.” Strand tells two good stories, the rise and fall of the science of weather modification and the development of Kurt Vonnegut as a writer, although each story might be better told in a book without so much of the other. Nevertheless, this engaging book raises many still-relevant questions about the uses of technology and nature. Agent: Jin Auh, Wylie Agency.

    • Library Journal

      January 1, 2016

      Strand (Killer on the Road) beautifully illustrates the lives of the Vonnegut brothers, Bernard and Kurt, and explores their contributions to their respective fields. During the firebombing of Dresden in World War II, while Kurt was hunkered down beneath a slaughterhouse (an experience upon which he later based Slaughterhouse-Five), his brother Bernard, a scientist, was testing out cloud seeding and ways of producing rain. The brothers led vastly different lives, but both worked for General Electric, which back then was lovingly referred to as the "house of magic." While there, Bernard experimented with weather control and Kurt reveled in all the fantastic things he saw and heard, many of which become the impetus for his later novels and short stories. Strand breaks down Bernard's science and Kurt's stories and produces a fascinating look at two different yet very similar brothers. VERDICT Compellingly narrated by Sean Runnette, this eye-opening read is perfect for both fans of science and of Kurt Vonnegut. ["The book is engaging owing to the author's rich characterization of historical persons, source material, and selective assemblage of events": LJ 9/1/15 review of the Farrar hc.]--Erin Cataldi, Johnson Cty. P.L., Franklin, IN

      Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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