Reading this book in the 2000's you gain a different perspective of the author's meanings that the reader of the 1960's would have had. At that time the fear was current in almost everybody's mind that the atomic bomb would soon wipe us out.

By now our thoughts about that have relaxed somewhat, firstly because it hasn't happened, and secondly because we are aware that other threats to humanity's continued existence might well finish us before a nuclear holocaust gets the chance. In that respect, Kurt Vonnegut was a true visionary. He asked the insightful question "What else are the scientists who created the bomb capable of inventing?"

One of the most worthwhile attributes of a good book is it's ability to shock into sudden awakening a dull or incomplete area of our understanding.

In his curiously named book James Baldwin comprehensively annihilated white people's murky, opaque view of the lives lived in Harlem ghettos. In fact, he did it so well that a conscientious white person can't help feeling ashamed of their ignorance while they read.

The title is apparently a verse from slave song "God gave Noah the rainbow sign, No more water, the fire next time!"