Vonnegut's fourth novel, it was first published on March 18, 1963,[1] exploring and satirizing issues of science, technology, the purpose of religion, and the arms race, often through the use of morbid humor.

Intrigued by Bokononism, the narrator later discovers the strange reality that nearly all residents of San Lorenzo, even including "Papa" Monzano himself, practice it in secret, and punishment by the hook is, in actuality, quite rare.

The freezing of the world's oceans immediately causes violent tornadoes to ravage the Earth, but the narrator manages to escape with Mona to a secret bunker beneath the palace.

Exploring the island for survivors, they discover a mass grave where all the surviving San Lorenzans committed suicide by touching ice-nine from the landscape to their mouths on the facetious advice of Bokonon, who has left a note of explanation.

The horrified narrator is discovered by a few other survivors, including Newt and Frank Hoenikker, and he lives with them in a cave for several months, during which time he writes the contents of the book.

Bokonon states that if he were younger, he would place a book about human stupidity on the peak of San Lorenzo's highest mountain, rest his head on it, swallow ice-nine, and die while thumbing his nose at God.

[2] The former is embodied in the creation of Bokononism, an artificial religion created to make life bearable to the beleaguered inhabitants of San Lorenzo through acceptance and delight in the inevitability of everything that happens.

In his 1969 address to the American Physical Society, Vonnegut describes the inspiration behind ice-nine and its creator as the type of "old-fashioned scientist who isn't interested in people", and draws connections to nuclear weapons.

When science fiction author H. G. Wells visited the labs in the 30s, the Nobel Prize-winning chemist Irving Langmuir suggested for him the idea of a story about a form of ice stable at room temperature.

The country's form of government is a dictatorship, under the rule of ailing president "Papa" Monzano, who is a staunch ally of the United States and a fierce opponent of communism.

The infrastructure of San Lorenzo is described as being dilapidated, consisting of worn buildings, dirt roads, an impoverished populace, and having only one working automobile taxi in the entire country.

McCabe, along with accomplice Lionel Boyd Johnson from Tobago, together threw out the island's governing sugar company and, after a period of anarchy, proclaimed a republic.

Bokononists are liable to be punished by being impaled on a hook, but Bokononism privately remains the dominant religion of nearly everyone on the island, including the leaders who outlaw it.

[12] Bokononist rituals are equally strange or absurdist; for example, the supreme religious act consists of any two worshippers rubbing the bare soles of their feet together to inspire spiritual connection.

Here are some Bokononist terms:[12] After The Sirens of Titan (1959) and Mother Night (1962) received favorable reviews and sold well in paperback, large publisher Holt, Rinehart, and Winston issued Cat's Cradle as a hardcover original.

[14] Theodore Sturgeon praised Cat's Cradle, describing its storyline as "appalling, hilarious, shocking, and infuriating", and concluded that "this is an annoying book and you must read it.