News Item

[Larry W. Chavis]

Being new, I'm not sure if I'm transgressing here, but I just read a news update from MSNBC that Kurt Vonnegut has died. I know, he isn't one of this genre, but I thought it might be of interest.

[Lesa Holstine]

Thank you, Larry, for passing this on. I checked MSNBC when you said it because Yahoo didn't have it listed yet. He was a giant. Thank you for letting us know.

[Anne Frasier]

RIP :( :( :(

[Charles Ardai]

This one really breaks my heart. I miss all the writers we've lost over the past few years, but Vonnegut...I have all his books, every one, even the handful of weaker ones, and I've read and re-read them all. What a great writer. What a gifted human being.

I remember seeing him on Jon Stewart's show a few months back, and already he could barely speak -- emphysema. That was painful. But this, of course, is worse.

There were no others like him, and I suspect there never will be again.

[Daniel Hatadi]

Kurt Vonnegut was his own genre. Damn.

[Patricia Abbott]

This is really true! Thanks for summing it up.

[Julie Morrigan]

Desperately sad news.

[J.D. Rhoades]

So it goes.

[Steve Allan]

Vonnegut was such an inspiration. I feel like a member of my family has passed away.

[Bill Crider]

The world is a better place for Vonnegut's having been here, and we'll always have the books to remind us of that.

[Larry W. Chavis]

Yes, that's how I feel. If I'm very, very lucky, one day something I write might give someone a few moments of pleasure, reflection, whatever ... Kurt Vonnegut not only influenced his time, he will continue to do so for generations. "Know ... that there is a prince and a great man fallen this day ..."

[Cornelia Read]

I had the honor of meeting him many years ago. I was around 20 at the time and had already read everything of his I could get my hands on. He was both gracious and wry in person. I'm sure I blushed and mumbled abominably.

Very surreal afternoon--his wife Jill Krementz had asked my foster sister to be in her book HOW IT FEELS TO BE ADOPTED, so we were waiting for her to get home.

Mr. V invited us to sit down at his kitchen table, where he was talking to Madeline Kahn. Very sad that they're both gone now. They were lovely people.