It's pretty amazing that Vonnegut could write so brilliantly about a technological backlash in a computerized society well before the age of the PC and the internet. Besides the fact that vacuum tubes are considered high tech in this book, it could have been written yesterday. You know, if he hadn't died. I didn't love the way the book wrapped up, but I'll cut him some slack since it was his first.

There were several moments in Player Piano where I felt I was reading a work by Joseph Heller with a side serving of George Orwell rather than Uncle Kurt. It’s a much more serious offering than his later work. The trademark satire isn’t entirely missing though, it’s just buried a few layers down in the subtext. But by trading ‘witty’ for ‘serious’ Player Piano serves up a hard-hitting book.

You’ll be familiar with the plot: a vision of the future where people are replaced, or are being replaced, by machines who can do more, better, faster. It’s hardly a new theme, but when you consider that Uncle Kurt wrote Player Piano in 1952, when the computer mainframe was in its infancy, it’s visionary. Nearly 70 years on, the premise resonates stronger than ever. And what’s more, we know this vision of an alternate future is startlingly on-point because we’re living in it.

Let’s hope some of Vonnegut’s other visions of the future, like ice-nine, aren’t quite so accurate.