8vo. Original green cloth, lettered in silver on spine; dust jacket (spine and panel edges toned). 

FIRST EDITION OF VONNEGUT'S FIRST BOOK, FIRST PRINTING with "A" and Scribner's seal on copyright page. Written during a period when automation and computing were beginning to transform American industry, the novel imagines a near-future society in which machines have largely replaced human labor, leaving most of the population economically and socially displaced. Drawing in part on Vonnegut’s experiences working at General Electric, the book blends satirical humor with sharp social criticism, anticipating later debates about technological unemployment and the human cost of mechanization. 

[With:] VONNEGUT. Utopia 14. New York: Bantam Books, 1954. Original color pictorial wrappers. FIRST PAPERBACK EDITION.