Thanks to the library, I now have a copy of The Sirens of Titan. It’s a clean 2006 trade paperback edition, apparently only checked out once before and possibly never read. It’s great but for the front cover, which looks almost exactly like Player Piano and all of the other Vonnegut novels produced by the same publisher.
I think the publisher made a mistake in using such nondescript covers. The experience of reading isn’t purely about the words within the covers. The physical attributes of a book—its look, smell, weight, thickness, and texture—can affect both how you feel as you’re reading and how you remember the reading later. This book feels comfortable, but the lack of a strong visual to go with it detracts in some small way from my enjoyment.
To compensate for the cover’s shortcomings, I’m going to add another element—music. Have you ever read a book and listened to music at the same time and found later that the two were completely intertwined in your memory? The best example I can think of is when I read Raymond E. Feist’s Faerie Tale while listening to Led Zeppelin’s Physical Graffiti. I reread the book years later and I could still hear those Zeppelin tunes playing in my head like a soundtrack, and when I listen to those tunes now, they still bring to mind vivid images from the book. The accidental marriage of book and music gave them each more depth than they had alone.
What work of music will I marry to The Sirens of Titan? Stay tuned.