Product Description

In this elegantly produced, extended conversation celebrating the writing craft, Kurt Vonnegut and acclaimed Grand Central Winter author Lee Stringer explore what it means to be a writer -- and what it means to be human.

It is an increasingly rare occasion these days to find two writers willing to speak candidly, thoughtfully, and concretely about the intersection of life and art. And that these two writers happen to be Kurt Vonnegut and Lee Stringer makes Like Shaking Hands With God a truly historic and joyous occasion. The setting is a bookstore in New York City in October 1998. Before a crowd of several hundred, Vonnegut and Stringer jump into the aesthetic fray, taking up humanity, writing, salvation, art, and the challenge of living, day to day.

As Vonnegut would say, "It was a magical evening." A passionate and inspiring discourse between two extraordinary writers, Like Shaking Hands With God is a book for anyone interested in why the simple act of writing things down can be so much more important than the amount of memory in our computers.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #385378 in Books
• Published on: 2000-12-01
• Released on: 2000-11-28
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 80 pages

Amazon.com Review
Kurt Vonnegut (Breakfast of Champions): writer of wild, satiric, outrageous fiction. Lee Stringer (Grand Central Winter): one-time homeless crack addict who discovered that pencils are not just drug implements. Kurt Vonnegut and Lee Stringer: a mutual admiration society. Like Shaking Hands with God: a transcription of two moderated conversations between Vonnegut and Stringer--one before a bookstore audience, one over lunch.

Shaking Hands has a slender profile and a pretty cover. But the only thing slight about these conversations is that they leave the reader wanting more. The book is billed as "a conversation about writing," but it is as much about life as about writing. Neither Vonnegut nor Stringer is interested in holing up in a garret to write. Vonnegut makes any excuse to go out and rub elbows with the folks who buy lottery tickets. Stringer wonders, "Can you write anything on Park Avenue, really?" Vonnegut laments his happy childhood as "no way for a writer to begin." Stringer panics--while he wrote his first book as if on a high, the next one may emerge from an awareness of Oprah and marketability.

Vonnegut and Stringer are passionate about one another's work, passionate about life, and passionate about writing, but not so much so that they ever, for a moment, lose their sense of irony or humor. In the age of the sound bite, literature can be deemed, on some level, useless. Stringer praises writing, in that context, as "a struggle to preserve our right to be not so practical." And Vonnegut? "We are here on Earth to fart around," he proclaims in Timequake (excerpted here). "Don't let anybody tell you any different!" --Jane Steinberg

Review
American Society of Journalists and Authors Newsletter An enthusiastic conversation about why and how they write...One of those brief dips into the psyche of very good authors that can be so motivation to all of us at various stages of our careers, no matter what we write or aspire to write. -- Review

Review
Jim KnipfelNew York PressThere's more honest wisdom in this little volume than you're likely to find in most any other single book this year. And not just about writing. This book's a gem.

The Hartford Advocate (CT)A rare thing...a book that is more about being than writing.

American Society of Journalists and Authors NewsletterAn enthusiastic conversation about why and how they write...One of those brief dips into the psyche of very good authors that can be so motivation to all of us at various stages of our careers, no matter what we write or aspire to write.

The WriterHere is the transcript of their conversation about where the lives they live meet the art they practice, with candid thoughts on writing, humanity, salvation, art, and the struggle and joy of living.

The Austin Chronicle (TX)The authors clearly have a profound respect for each other and for their craft.

Customer Reviews

Disappointing
I really enjoyed Stringer's Grand Center Winter and am a life-long fan of Vonnegut. But I was terribly disappointed by this edited transcript from a couple of conversations between the two writers. Given the great potential of such gifted writers, this book seems little more than mutual admiration; it's short on substance or gravity and provides little insight to those of us who may be interested in the art of writing. I would have probably felt far better about this if it had been, instead, a magazine piece. But at this price I expected more substance.

A WRITERS' CONVERSATION
Anything by Kurt Vonnegut is good! Well almost anything. I was attracted to this gem featuring two authors of different generations conversing about the meaning of writing in their lives. I expected an enlightening tome that would set my mind to thinking and provide me with new insight.

Neither happened. Vonnegut and Stringer are good writers but these interviews just didn't come off well in print. A question is raised as to what the two writers had in common. Stringer gave some good points but Vonnegut rambled on into the wild blue yonder. Of the two, Stringer appeared to stay focused on the questions and provided the reader with insight as to how writing impacted on his life and freed him from his own internal demons.

As a collector's item in your Vonnegut library, yes, do indeed purchase it. If you want something more in depth with Vonnegut and Stringer read their works. This text just doesn't get to the heart of their writing world.

The art of Being

This is a wisp of a book. At less than 80 pages, I read it in one evening in the time it took me to eat a few tapas and down two pints of beer. By the time the check arrived, I was already writing down my thoughts inside the back cover.

But what an enjoyable wisp it is!

Almost everyone I know is a fan of Kurt Vonnegut, and so the colorful and curmudgeonly wisdom he brings to the table here is no surprise. But who is this Lee Stringer guy? By the end, I began to think of him as a superior version of James Frey (author of the badly written pseudo memoir "A Million Little Pieces") with the main difference that Mr. Stringer (1) writes well and (2) his tales about life on Skid Row are true. Actually, now that I think of it, that's kind of like saying I'm like Shakespeare except that he (1) writes a lot better and (2) he's been dead for almost 400 years.

Anyway, back to the book: I admit that Like Shaking Hands With God doesn't offer a great price-per-word ratio (it's slim and relatively expensive) but it does offer a great deal of wisdom on its handful of pages. Based on two conversations between two friends with a lot of respect for each other, these guys are smart, they know how to express themselves, and they've been around the block a few times.

The book bills itself as "a conversation about writing" and it is that. But it's more of a conversation about being, but a kind of being that involves writing. For a lot of avid readers, that's a perfect fit.