Never really been a fan of the sci-fi genre. Especially when we're talking about blasting off to other planets and moons, or dealing with Martian Invasions. Just not my thing. I only read this because it's Vonnegut - pure and simple - as it's my goal to complete all his novels over time. Had he not wrote this then it's likely I wouldn't have even considered reading it. There is no doubt that he fills The Sirens of Titan with some extravagant concepts - probably more so than all the other Vonnegut novels I've read put together - and again he sticks the knife in with some lacerating satire, but, I just didn't find this as fun as some of his others. Humorous and playful it most certainly is, but upon completion; and only upon completion, did it start to dawn on me that there was something terrifying and sombre about it too. All because of Vonnegut's reluctance not to reveal or answer any of the pertinent questions within until its too late. Clever, to a certain degree. Despite the fact that this is overloaded with bizarre descriptions and situations, the novel is kept from being overly complex thanks to his sharp and simple writing style. Never did I lose track of what was going on. Generally, The Sirens of Titan felt like a casual read. And I never expected that. Religion. Space travel. Philosophical inclinations. A war between Mars and Earth. Scathing satire. Could you imagine if Pynchon had wrote this and made it three times as long? My god! Now that would have been something.

A solid 3/5. I just felt it lacked the backbone of later novels.

Vonnegut came along as my mind was maturing so very long ago. Thank you for this, and your other works, Mr Vonnegut.

I read this many years ago, but am rereading with "The Evolution of Science Fiction" group.
https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/...

I remember liking this more back when I first read it in the 70's. I think both the times & my age had a lot to do with that. It never captivated me. Vonnegut made each character a caricature of some ideal of our society & then used that achievement & their flaws to destroy them so that when I didn't actively dislike them, I pitied them. It wasn't subtly done, either. Vonnegut smacked them down with ridiculous, ham-fisted finality & then dragged them into their next moment of truth, only to find out it was really just a lie.

It's an absurd morality tale, mildly humorous & immensely sad, that tell us there is no meaning to our lives or civilization. We'd be happiest if we quit trying to pretend there was. The only way to be truly happy is to embrace the situation & love those you're with. Well, that's how I see it, anyway.

Vonnegut's writing isn't for everyone. His humor isn't particularly subtle & can be depressing. He writes like a moody drunk which is kind of fun, but gets old after a while. My favorite book by him has always been Welcome to the Monkey House (which I just downloaded), a collection of short stories. The brevity & focus of a short story suits his style & my appreciation of it far better. I just downloaded Armageddon in Retrospect, a collection of twelve new and unpublished writings on war and peace that was published a year after his death. I'm looking forward to it.

Sigh. Classic science fiction? No... classic drek and manure.I hated the book and almost didn't finish it because I got to a terrible misogynistic bit at the end where the main female character thanks her rapist for raping her. Argh. Going to go pound my head on the wall now.

OK so Sirens of Titan is my 4th book by Vonnegut. The other three were Cat's Cradle, Slaughterhouse Five, and Timequake. It took me a little bit to get into this story, but after a little while - since I was familiar with his style - it kind of clicked with me. Rating Vonnegut against Vonnegut I would say that of what I've read this probably comes in 3rd - with Cat's Cradle and Slaughterhouse Five ahead - with the latter being on my favorites shelf. As I settled into the book I decided I ought to add Kurt to my favorite author shelves in Goodreads. Going to do this I noticed that I hadn't added any authors to my favorite author shelf so I had to fix that. I added Kurt along with Brandon Sanderson, Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, James S.A. Corey and Blake Crouch.

Another thing that I did partway through this book was watch a documentary on Vonnegut called “Kurt Vonnegut: Unstuck In Time” (My daughter and I both like Vonnegut and she was the one that actually mentioned this to me). This was actually quite interesting and helped me understand a little better what makes Kurt Kurt. During this time of his career he had just transitioned from selling short stories to magazines to start making full size novels. This was quite a change for him. He locked himself away in a basement room working on ideas. A huge change for him was that he had just brought into his family his sister’s four children (so now 6 kids to watch after) as she has recently passed away from cancer.

I looked at how folks on Goodreads had shelved this - most had selected science fiction - and I get that. What I didn't quite get was how few had selected humor. This to me was equal parts satire and humor as it was science fiction. As this was written in 1959 it was probably one of the earliest attempts at combining humor and science fiction. When it comes down to it mixing those genres isn't all that common even at the present time. You have Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Red Dwarf, We are Legion We are Bob, and not much else.

در مورد مذهب، خدا، اراده، هدف، انسانیت و جستجوی معنای زندگی

ونه‌گات از معدود آدماییه که وقتی از زندگی می‌گه و نصیحتت می‌کنه حظ می‌کنی

Vonnegut is my new God. I can't believe I haven't read anything else by him after reading Galapagos back in 85. For real? I do remember really liking it, being quite enthused, but it seemed like his other big book was Slaughterhouse Five, which I didn't want to read. Isn't it about a prison camp for captured soldiers? Or something like that? I don't like reading stories like that, there's enough horror in real life.

But what was I thinking? I guess at the time I was too busy trying to become someone else, too engrossed in myself to recognize that my own black humor and sarcasm is my saving grace. But oh he's so much smarter than me!

Sirens of Titans is why I read sf. THis book is such a perfect gem. We've got the situation on earth, so short-sighted, and then the broader contemplation of the slow swinging of the universe measured in increments larger than millennium.

Mind-blowing, and so much to think about. About the means to justify the ends, and the ends themselves. Well, that's because I'm still trying to apply reason to a universe of accidents and apathy.

Vonnegut's second published novel already shows him at a peak, with his seemingly careless signature style (don't be tricked!) already established and his pages just overflowing with ideas and philosophical questions.



The Sirens of Titan is one of the more straight-forward science-fiction stories of Kurt Vonnegut's oeuvre. It tells the story of Winston Niles Rumfoord, who after a space travel mishap can only materialise as a person once for an hour every fifty-nine days. Ever since, however, he also has had total knowledge of everything that ever will be. Including that his wide will be mated with the richest man in the world on Mars. Or that on Saturn's moon Titan an alien called Tralfamadore is waiting to take off into space.

This is a wild, crazy ride through space and the world of humans. I might have said this in another review of his work before, but Vonnegut has this insane way of tackling scary theories with humour and a lightheartedness that makes you actually enjoy what he's implying. Which is usually not too good for humanity as a whole. Free will, after all, is a major theme in this one. Just think about it – if our decisions are controlled by a higher power, who controls that higher power? Suddenly the entire universe feels like nothing more than a game of chess, and yet it remains unclear who's moving the pieces.

Think more of Alice in Wonderland than Asimov when approaching this one. This is clearly science fiction – after all, you've got interplanetary travel, spaceships, aliens and all that jazz. And yet, Vonnegut is less concerned with world building or creating a believable universe. Like in other works of his, he's using the platform of the genre to do some pondering about things concerning us in our reality. It's somewhat of an eccentric allegory.

There's so much hidden depth in what seems like a straight-forward story. One of the most fascinating things about this is the juxtaposition about what's being said and how it's being said. Vonnegut's style is simple, straight-forward. Sometimes it feels messy even, as if he just splattered the first words coming to his mind onto the page. But then upon closer examination, you'll find an abundance of references to ideas, references and comments. I can safely say that I'm far from having detangled all of this yet, which is as exciting as it is awe-inspiring.

As so often, I've got to give a shoutout to my reading buddy Leonard, who's working his way through Vonnegut's works with me. You can read what he had to say about this one here!

n  n    “there is no reason why good cannot triumph as often as evil. the triumph of anything is a matter of organization. if there are such things as angels, i hope that they are organized along the lines of the mafia.”n  n

this is a story about a man and his dog.

they materialize in a backyard every 59 days and impart the wisdom of the future onto nearby bystanders and the man’s butler. his wife will not listen.

this is also a story about a very lucky billionaire whose luck runs out.

he ends up in the far reaches of the universe, visiting mars and mercury and titan; all in pursuit of the lovely sirens the man with the dog has promised him. and since the man with the dog knows the future, the billionaire eagerly follows his advice.

there are many others, too, albeit more on the periphery of the story: a respectable businesswoman who becomes a teacher and a mother; a young delinquent with a good luck charm; a best friend who dies horribly; a soldier looking for more balance in his life and finding it underground.

but most of all, this is a story about the meaning of life.


© Chris Moore

i thought this was a clever, well-crafted read.

vonnegut has quite the philosophical story to tell that genuinely makes you think as he strips back the narrative layer by layer. don’t be surprised if a character ends up becoming (or being) the total opposite of who you thought they were at the start.

and yet he writes with charm and humor, which i honestly hadn’t expected. but i’m glad he did, because it made this story so much more fun to read. there’s an absurdist, surreal undertone to the entire book that’s only enhanced by these little humorous moments, making for an entertaining (and timeless!) reading experience.

n  “sometimes i think it is a great mistake to have matter that can think and feel. it complains so. by the same token, though, i suppose that boulders and mountains and moons could be accused of being a little too phlegmatic.”n

and even though the premise seems so simple -- billionaire who loses everything seeks fortune in space aided by all-seeing man with dog -- i’m pretty sure you could write 40+ page essays attempting to analyze the amount of literary stuff that vonnegut slipped in there.

paying attention to characters’ names and keeping greek mythology in mind when it comes to planets and other locations should already cover a lot of it, i think.

there’s A LOT of social commentary in here, too. mostly about the ways in which us humans delude ourselves into finding meaning or purpose for our lives; how we attempt to explain away the existence of our world, of the universe. the emptiness that we end up chasing without appreciating what’s right in front of us.

n  “the big trouble with dumb bastards is that they are too dumb to believe there is such a thing as being smart.”n

organized religion gets a huge kick to the curb in this discussion as well. “the church of god the utterly indifferent” had me in stitches. divine providence will not save you in vonnegut’s book, no matter how hard you may wish it were so.

this is definitely a book about ideas and our overarching humanity rather than it is about individual characters. the inherent tragedy -- chasing the nonexistent meaning of life and the universe rather than living it -- of it all invites a sense of nihilistic melancholia.

in that aspect, it firmly reminded me of other classics such as the hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy (humorous tone & surrealist vibes included) or even the great gatsby (re: the melancholic / nostalgic feelings).

i do think i personally prefer a book like hitchhiker’s.

sirens is very much about the journey, revealing its final message only in the last few pages of the book. and in doing so, it invites a much larger amount of needless suffering: rape, execution, war, death. these characters dance like marionettes under the control of something they aren’t even aware of.

hitchhiker’s is upfront about it much sooner, employing a much lighter tone. the universe is one big joke, but we’re all in on it. and if nothing matters, why should we not choose to have fun rather than do boring shit all day?

that is not to say that these books are exactly the same and fully comparable; vonnegut definitely has a couple of harder truths to deliver than douglas adams ever does, i think. plus, it’s obviously very subjective which of the two stories ends up resonating with you the most.

i think my own preference comes from the fact that despite its final message and continuous humor, sirens mostly made me feel empty inside rather than comforted by what it had to say.


© Jim Burns

a pleasant surprise while reading this was how timeless it felt. seriously! for 90% of the book, i was barely even noticing i was reading a story first published in 1959.

however, we do get a few blasts from the past which i still want to address.

first of all, the weird racist things: the only black character speaks very differently from all the others despite all of them being either english, american or alien. there’s also emphasis on the fact that he’s by far the physically strongest and most imposing character.

there’s also a bit of an obsession with the only prominent female character starting to look more and more like an indian (and / or ‘gypsy queen’) as the book goes along, brown skin included. this in direct contrast to when she was young and happy, which is explicitly referenced multiple times through a painting of her dressed in all white with pale skin.

and then there’s the fact that when the same prominent female character gets raped, her husband makes an incredibly tasteless joke about it. and once the book is getting ready to deliver its final message and all characters have learned their lesson, her final act is to… thank her rapist for raping her.

… yeah. that’s the culmination of her arc. i did NOT see that one coming.

but the one i’ll end on is the oldest published ‘no homo’ i have encountered so far. it was so far out of left field that i think i barked a surprised scoff of a laugh when i read it. judge for yourself:

n  “salo didn't think he could stand that because he loved winston niles rumfoord. there was nothing offensive in this love. that is to say, it wasn't homosexual.”n

hey, 1959? ursula k. le guin is calling from 1969. the left hand of darkness just dropped. any comments?


© Craig Atteberry

so where does that leave us?

i think this book is a great recommendation for anyone who wants to read an exploration of free will and the meaning of life in a science-fiction setting. it’s got plenty of layers and philosophy, and its dry wit and absurdist commentary serve it very well.

vonnegut’s style of writing, tone, and prose were undoubtedly my favorite things about the novel. it’s also made me a lot more interested in the rest of his work.

however, i also struggle to put a proper rating to the sirens of titan. because even though i can recognize that it’s pretty damn well-written and approaches its subject matter in a clever and original way, it simply did not manage to fully grab and engage me.

part of that was its bleakness; part of that was its treatment of the only prominent female character and its no homo vibes. which is, of course, intertwined with its bleakness as it profoundly changes its message on free will for a female character versus a male character.

i will say this: i, too, wish i could live in the beautiful crystal caves of mercury and spend the rest of my life cuddling with translucent kites that are happily listening to my heartbeat. though maybe only if i can get 5G on top of it.

✎ 3.0 stars.

I do not care for this novel at all and have stopped reading about 75 pages in. The novel just seems pure whimsy to me, like Vonnegut can make up the rules up as he goes along, allow his characters to do or say anything, and it really doesn't have to be consistent with what happened before, or make sense in terms of human nature. Nothing of significance is therefore ever really at stake.

If you read chiefly to find out what happens next, to root for a character or a situation, for the sake of the suspense inherent in a novel, as I do, this novel will surely disappoint. There is no suspense whatsoever to be found, and only the most capricious of plots.

If you read a book chiefly for its humor, again I think Sirens will disappoint. It has some mildly comical moments, even a few somewhat amusing situations, but certainly nothing truly funny. If the novel is supposed to be satire, again, be prepared for disappointment. At best, Vonnegut is nibbling, never biting.

That only leaves one small area the novel works well in, namely, some of the word choices and concepts. They are quite clever. But this only makes me realize Vonnegut's power and the depth of his failure here. This novel is a deeply thought out, carefully, sometimes even beautifully worded work. It just doesn't have anything of any real importance to say. At least it doesn't seem to begin to have anything to say in the first 75 pages I read, and I came to doubt it ever would. So I put the novel down, disappointed.

The Sirens of Titan is a rare masterwork, a novel with broad and varied powers. It is an elusive book that seeks you out, a panorama of arresting images, a cosmic drama played out across the galaxy and set in the devices of the future but capturing eternal beauty as though in indestructible stone. At its simplest, it is the story of Malachi Constant, who despite his egotistical intentions, endures mental and physical suffering, isolation, and the loss of his own identity in order to be reunited with the family he hardly knows. At the same time, it is an impossible, ridiculous, audacious tale that involves interplanetary war, breaking the laws of time and space, mind control, an atheist religion, and spaceships powered by Nietzschean metaphors. It takes an unimaginably deft touch to make this overreaching jumble of tone and genre work. For it not to be a mess is a major accomplishment, but the genius of this novel is that it enthralls. The tone is often absurd but never silly, combining morbid humour with surprise emotional blows to nurture a chiaroscuro of thought and emotion that prompts a buzz of elation rather than one distinct response. It does drag a little in the exposition, but the narrator quickly commands your inquiry and the book rarely slackens its pace until the beautiful and alien finale. No other work I've discovered has the same power of destabilization, of uprooting your resting assumptions and depicting what is and what could be.

I'm one of those people who like to pick on the super popular works of SF especially when the literary intelligencia has deemed so-and-so SF writers better than the common hoi polloi. I have to see what is up with them, find a reason to bring them back to the SF fold rather than the claustrophobic Literary BS.

So what happens when I pick up Vonnegut and read him?

I like him. Again. Damn it. In fact, The Sirens of Titan may be my favorite. It's a toss-up between The Breakfast of Champions and this. Slaughterhouse Five is third. I was bored the first time I read Cat's Cradle, so I'll leave that off this list. :)

This is a funny book. It tackles so much. Predestination, luck, a god with a nasty sense of humor, more luck as a cosmic joke, and lots of rented tents. Rent a tent! Rent a tent! :)

Ostensibly, this SF pulp novel feels like an SF pulp novel with spaceships, a war with Mars, little music loving aliens on Mercury, and a mad ancient sculptor on Titan. Add a little shock to the system with all time and space open to ya and your cosmic dog, and all the good and bad luck of the universe will befall our MC. :)

Again, pretty wild.

So what is this? A pulpy-SF from '58? It's certainly light, funny, and entertaining.

But I suppose it's gotten the attention it has gotten for one big reason. It has depth, too. A lot to say about God. Insanity. Memory. And almost nothing good to say about modern society. It is, in every respect, a light satire.

More importantly, it's great writing. :) I totally recommend this to everyone.