Rating: 
Summary: eccentric, naive, and often rather dull
Review: After greatly enjoying some Vonnegut sci-fi, I was perhaps looking for the wrong thing with this book. It is a weird story about a nutty millionaire, who is in danger of losing his money to an assembly of the sleaziest twits you could possibly imagine. While there are many very funny asides, such as his love of Kilgore Troustian conceptions or the characterizations of the evil guys (one's posterior is "luminous when wet"), the plot is weak and far-fetched. For example, Rosewater's grandfather built his massive fortune by buying companies in accordance with their acronyms from the Bible's text! That is too silly to be satire. Moreover, Vonnegut's laments about the coldness and brutality of American capitalism are sentimental and even ignorent. He seems to have an obsession with rich people.
Not recommended.
Rating:
Summary: eccentric, naive, and often rather dull
Review: After greatly enjoying some Vonnegut sci-fi, I was perhaps looking for the wrong thing with this book. It is a weird story about a nutty millionaire, who is in danger of losing his money to an assembly of the sleaziest twits you could possibly imagine. While there are many very funny asides, such as his love of Kilgore Troustian conceptions or the characterizations of the evil guys (one's posterior is "luminous when wet"), the plot is weak and far-fetched. For example, Rosewater's grandfather built his massive fortune by buying companies in accordance with their acronyms from the Bible's text! That is too silly to be satire. Moreover, Vonnegut's laments about the coldness and brutality of American capitalism are sentimental and even ignorent.Not recommended.
Rating:
Summary: disappointing
Review: As a huge vonnegut fan, I was very upset to find that this book had a badly developed plot, uninteresting characters, and an almost tragic lack of all the things that make a vonnegut novel great. There really wasn't even what I'd call a complete story, and I skipped a lot of pages out of boredom just to keep things moving. Not recommended for anyone except the rare person who thinks Vonnegut's good books are bad and wants to read a bad one for the sheer pleasure of it all.
Rating: 
Summary: Never Out of Date
Review: Eliot Rosewater is a fat and mediocre minded do-gooder. What makes him extraordinary is that he has the means, through the Rosewater foundation, to dole out money to anyone who requests a bit. In his home town of Rosewater, Indiana, where he has returned like the prodigal mad citizen, he ignores society, purchases an enormous fire alarm, bankrolls the fire company and personally answers 24 hour calls over two telephones- one for assistance and the other for fire emergencies. He has different composures, voices and rules for each. The cranks who phone him for money are old drunken, ugly spinsters, none too clean or honorable town 'handymen,' and his father, the famous Senator Rosewater; whom seeing his son, shrieks at God, for having handed him this vale of tears. Elliott drinks too much, cannot father an heir and has driven his otherwise loving wife to a arsonist's breakdown. She torched the Fire Company. Eliott has no grand plan of philanthropy, not even a cause, unless the volunteer firemen and their work count. He has a quasi Buddhist detachment from hatred as well as wealth and status. Plenty of people, especially the evil Norman Mushari, are out to filch his millions and crucify his reputation in the meantime.
The book examines the Rosewater mutation whereby every couple of generations, a male is born with no aspiration. No desire to scratch and claw or otherwise greedily grasp power from others. Vonnegut's thematic puncturing of capitalism, European fatuousness and the nature of success and failure is showcased with the also unseemly nature of the non-wealthy and unsuccessful. Mushari goes face to face with the God of most of Vonnegut's cosmology- Kilgore Trout, science fiction writer. The book is part of the canon of this icon of an author and as such, I recommend it highly to one and all. The time when I first read it, was a time when I still found drunks a riot and even the smallest attack upon the status quo enormously satisfying. We are no longer that naive and yet the lessons and the funniness of just about everything can never be dated.
Rating:
Summary: Pearls Before Swine
Review: Eliot Rosewater is giving away his money (and love and attention) to deserving people... and some maybe not so deserving. This proves he is crazy. Hence the subtitle "Pearls Before Swine." That's the setup in this minor Vonnegut novel. Eliot has no illusions about the quality of the people he sometimes helps or how far his help will go. But he insists that the world would be a better place if everyone gave a little something to each other. This in turn sets Eliot up for a confrontation with a lawyer and his Senator father as the family fortune is threatened because Eliot can be proven insane. After all, he's giving it away. He must be crazy. Kilgore Trout comes to the rescue with his usual comically inverted (and yet somehow truer) morals. This isn't Vonnegut's best but it is a pleasant and gentle novel with a bit of a moral and some good comic moments. A nice read.
Rating: 
Summary: The Tale of St. Eliot of Rosewater
Review: Eliot Rosewater was the scion of an extremely wealthy family- his grandfather had even married a Rockefeller. Eliot stood to inherit control of the vast family fortune through the Rosewater Foundation (a legal entity constructed to shield that fortune from taxation.) But then Eliot went off to WW2 to become a highly decorated Captain of combat infantry. He served with men from all walks of life. Oh yes, he also accidentally bayoneted a 14-year old non-combatant, and afterwards tried to throw himself under a truck. After this he was never the same, much to his rich and powerful family's distress. While he did come back to graduate from Harvard Law and assume control of the foundation, he started behaving...irrationally. He started to actually use the money to HELP people! He also started drinking, wandering, and visiting volunteer firehouses- among other eccentricities.
Eventually, he ended up in Rosewater, Indiana- a depressed backwater that his family had long ago used up and abandoned to found the beginnings of their fortune. He found the people there to be without pride, without hope, without work. So he opened up an office over the liquor store in order to help anyone who needed his help. The sign on the door said simply, "Rosewater Foundation: How Can We Help You?" So Eliot Rosewater, philanthropist, poet, volunteer fireman, Harvard graduate, and drunk proceeded to help any and all that came to him for help.
Needless to say his family could not allow such insanity to continue. Why even Eliot's psychoanalyst came to the conclusion that Eliot was a pervert. The nature of his perversion being the fact that he had channeled all his psychic energy into bringing Utopia to earth for all those in need. What could be more abnormal in modern, capitalist society?
This is my absolute all time favorite Vonnegut novel- and I have read them all.
Oh yes, it also offers one of the best descriptions of the absurdity and injustice of the class system in the U.S. As one of the characters asks, who does run this crazy country? These cr**ps sure don't.
Rating:
Summary: My Favorite Book of All Time
Review: I can understand why a lot of people might not like this book. It is a complete thrashing of the American system of Free Enterprise, so if you buy into social Darwinism (Republican?), you may find this book offensive. I am reading this book for the fifth time and I can tell you that it is the best book I've ever read. Rosewater is my favorite character Vonnegut has created. If you are open minded enough, this book could have quite an impact on the way you want to live your life. Due to our current political situation here in the US, there has never been a better time to read this book. Buy it and read it immediately. You won't be sorry.
Rating:
Summary: Observation
Review: I've just discovered Rosewater and Trout in Vonnegut's book Slaughterhouse-Five....I'm interested to see what comical situations they get into in this book.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful book
Review: Okay, so God Bless You... may not be the the best thing Vonnegut's ever written, but Vonnegut on an off day is still well worth reading. This book has all his trademarks, from biting social commentary and blazing satire to dark humor and quirky characters. It's a speedy read that will make you both laugh and wince by turns. Don't make it the first Vonnegut book you read -- for that, I'd suggest Slaughterhouse 5 -- but if you're a fan give it a whirl.
Rating: 
Summary: It's not his best, but it's clearly Vonnegut
Review: Okay, so God Bless You... may not be the the best thing Vonnegut's ever written, but Vonnegut on an off day is still well worth reading. This book has all his trademarks, from biting social commentary and blazing satire to dark humor and quirky characters. It's a speedy read that will make you both laugh and wince by turns. Don't make it the first Vonnegut book you read -- for that, I'd suggest Slaughterhouse 5 -- but if you're a fan give it a whirl.
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