Kurt Vonnegut dead at 84

After the book was published, Vonnegut went into severe depression and vowed never to write another novel. In 1984, he tried to take his life with sleeping pills and alcohol. His mother had herself committed suicide.

Vonnegut mixed fiction and autobiography in his work, which also blended elements of science fiction and touched on authoritarianism and the dehumanization of man by technology.

Fans said he invented a new literary type but some critics accused him of recycling themes and characters.

"Cat's Cradle" was published in 1963 and initially sold only about 500 copies but it remains widely read today in high school English classes.

Vonnegut's last book, published in 2005, was a collection of biographical essays, "A Man Without a Country."

A fourth-generation German-American who was born in Indianapolis, Vonnegut is survived by his second wife photographer Jill Krementz, their daughter and his six other children. Two of his children are published authors.

Mark Vonnegut, named after Mark Twain whom his father admired and bore a striking resemblance to, wrote "The Eden Express: A Memoir of Insanity" about his own descent and eventual recovery from mental illness. He speculated the illness was partly hereditary.

Daughter Edith Vonnegut, an artist, wrote "Domestic Goddesses," which takes issue with traditional art imagery in which women are shown as weak and helpless.