Kurt Vonnegut's 26th book, "Armageddon in Retrospect," a collection of unpublished essays and stories, with illustrations and a personal letter from the author, was published posthumously in 2008.

The second posthumous book from the author is "Look at the Birdie," which contains 14 unpublished early stories, illustrations and a letter from Vonnegut at age 29.

Which raises the question: How many more packaged books can we expect from the Vonnegut family vault? Given how celebrated Vonnegut is for writing such masterful works as "Cat's Cradle" and "Slaughterhouse-Five," one wonders if this latest, lesser book is necessary.

In the book's foreword, Sidney Offit points out that the "stories selected for this collection are reminiscent of the entertainments" of the '50s and early '60s. Indeed, the landscape is crowded with artifacts of that era: phonographs, newsboys, talk of the "Russians" and a door-to-door salesman.

Even the story "FUBAR" - or "fouled up beyond all recognition" - has its definition bleached to fit midcentury mores. Fuzz Littler, public relations supervisor, spends "his fubar days" working for a company that has 527 buildings. He's reassigned to Building 523, "the company gym," where among the swimming pool and bowling alley he responds to "foolish and rambling" letters. Enter Francine, a typist fresh from the Girl Pool, who saves Fuzz from his job, and himself.

Despite the antiquated tone of these early fictions, most do include glimmers of Vonnegut's trademark wit, humor and morality. His transgressors always get punished. The decent are rewarded. And at times his cutting observations are on full display: "While bachelors are lonely people, I'm convinced that married men are lonely people with dependents."

The book's longest "entertainment" - "Ed Luby's Key Club" - unfortunately reads like a B-grade noir film. In it, a couple pays a visit to the town of Ilium, which is controlled by rich, powerful Ed Luby, "a vicious old man, absolutely bald, short and heavy, built like a .45-caliber slug." Luby kills a prostitute and blames the murder on the naive twosome. Harve, the husband, then escapes from jail by simply running out the door.

It's a flippant caper, and the collection's longest. Vonnegut thankfully nails the character descriptions, "their faces as undistinguished as two cheap pies," even as the plot sputters and unravels: Harve jumps aboard a moving train, hops off, finds a distant farmhouse, then gets taken hostage by a shotgun-wielding man. Near the end, he's escorted to the hospital where, to assist the final surprise, "truth serum" is administered.

There are similar false notes, too, such as the bloated first line of the opener, "Confido": "The Summer had died peacefully in its sleep, and Autumn, as soft-spoken executrix, was locking life up safely until Spring came to claim it." In other words, the story begins during the fall.

These tales run the gamut, from science fiction to domestic yarns, from the facile to the sure-footed. It seems that Vonnegut is working out the kinks in these early attempts. And when he does hit a note well, he hits it just right.

"Little Drops of Water," laced with insight and maturity, is the collection's strongest. Larry Whiteman, a bachelor baritone singer, seduces young women while giving them voice lessons. When he tires of them, he breaks up by making them graduate. "The cue for graduation was the pupil's overt use of the word marriage." Along comes the appropriately named Ellen Sparks, who refuses to "detach" from Larry after graduation. Smitten, then scorned, Ellen grinds her way into Larry's life by sending him postcards, honking her horn outside his apartment and "rattling the garbage can at bedtime."

"All of her annoyances were regular, predictable, which made it very easy for Larry to assimilate them into the clockwork of his life and ignore them." Bit by bit, these drops of water soon form grooves in Larry's daily life. And the moment she withholds these small annoyances, "the die is cast," and Larry begins to miss her terribly.

What's interesting, and educational, about "Look at the Birdie" is the glimpse it gives us of Vonnegut's early development. This volume speaks to the power of artistic maturation. Writers improve with time, with dedication, with age. When reading these stories, even with their blemishes, the biggest thrill is the knowledge that this young author would later produce some of the most innovative and memorable books of the 20th century.

Look at the Birdie

Unpublished Short Fiction

By Kurt Vonnegut

(Delacorte Press; 251 pages; $27)