Look at the Birdie is a collection of fourteen previously unpublished short stories by Kurt Vonnegut, released on October 20, 2009. It is the second posthumously published Kurt Vonnegut book, the first being Armageddon in Retrospect.
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was a 20th century American writer. His works such as Cat's Cradle , Slaughterhouse-Five , and Breakfast of Champions blend satire, gallows humor, and science fiction. As a citizen he was a lifelong supporter of the American Civil Liberties Union and a critical leftist... intellectual. He was known for his humanist beliefs and was honorary president of the American Humanist Association. Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. was born in Indianapolis, Indiana, to third-generation German-American parents, Kurt Vonnegut, Sr. and Edith Lieber. Both his father and his grandfather Bernard Vonnegut attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology and were architects in the Indianapolis firm of Vonnegut & Bohn. His great-grandfather Clemens Vonnegut, Sr. was the founder of the Vonnegut Hardware Company, an Indianapolis institution. Vonnegut graduated from Shortridge High School in Indianapolis in May 1940 and matriculated into Cornell University that fall. Though majoring in chemistry, he was Assistant Managing Editor and Associate Editor of The Cornell Daily Sun.more
Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but... rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical, cinematic or musical work. Fiction contrasts with non-fiction, which deals exclusively with factual events, descriptions, observations, etc. . Realistic fiction, although untrue, could actually happen. Some events, people, and places may even be real. This is termed "faction". It can be possible that in the future imagined events could physically happen. For example, Jules Verne's novel From The Earth To The Moon, which at that time was just a product of his rich imagination, was proven possible in 1969, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin set foot on the Moon, and the team returned safely to Earth. Realistic fiction strives to make the reader feel as if they're reading something that is actually happening—something that though not real, is described in a believable way that helps the reader make a picture as if it were an actual event.more
An anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler. It may be a collection of poems, short stories, plays, songs, or excerpts. In... genre fiction anthology is used to categorize collections of shorter works such as short stories and short novels, usually collected into a single volume for publication. The word derives from the Greek word ἀνθολογία for garland — or bouquet of flowers — which was the title of the earliest surviving anthology, assembled by Meleager of Gadara. Meleager's Garland became the seed that grew into the Greek Anthology. The term miscellany is also used, but was more common in the past. In medieval Europe the term florilegium, again meaning a collection of flowers, was used for an anthology of Latin proverbs and textual excerpts. The complete collections of works are often called Complete Works or Opera Omnia . The term is also applied to radio or TV programs, movies, comic books and other such media featuring a variety of different stories. Examples of radio anthologies are Suspense and Escape.more