Quicksilver (The Baroque Cycle No. 1) Mass Market Paperback – January 31, 2006

This is a long book and, as usual with Stephenson books, you need patience at the beginning to grasp what is going on. Several interrelated plots take place in Europe and Massachusetts between the years of 1650 and 1715. The reader gets an inside look at the plots and intrigues of the royal families in England, France and Dutch kingdoms while getting also a fascinating look at the quest for knowledge that famous members of the Royal Society (Hooke, Boyle, Huygens, Leibniz, et al) pursued in those years, performing sometimes weird experiments fueled by their ignorance while discovering some of the laws of physics through clear genius and perseverance. The author portrays Isaac Newton as a dark person, heavily involved in Alchemy, a loner , although a genius , and suggest that Hooke came out first with an insight of the gravitational theory. The rivalry between Newton and Leibniz plays a significant part in the plot (both developed Calculus at about the same time in different places). It's an extraordinary history of historical fiction. And it's a trilogy if you're a true fan.

Quicksilver is the first volume in a really, really long historical novel about the creation of modern science, modern commerce, modern politics and the enlightenment. It is written in an arch, faux 17th century voice (similar to the one used by John Barth in his classic "The Sot Weed Factor." Reading it will take you a lot of time, no matter how quickly you read! So, should you invest your hard earned minutes of leisure bedding down with Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle? (I'll cut to the chase - I loved it so much that I read the entire series twice)Do you like adventure stories about piracy?Ever wonder about the plague, the London fire of 1666, and the debauchery of the Restoration?Do you like stories about counterfeiting? How about ones starring Isaac Newton as a master of disguise?Do you like crazed conspiracy tales filled with bodice ripping, massive amounts of gold, the King of France, and a man with bizarrely mutilated genitalia?Do you care about the philosophy of science, but also enjoy really ridiculous puns based on imaginary languages?Do you like harem girls who turn into world-straddling giants of commerce?Did you enjoy Cryptonomicon, and wonder what the ancestors of those characters might have been like?Have you ever wondered about whether the big fight about "who invented calculus" actually may have been really important?Do you like reading about the people who created the modern world?Did you ever wonder whether Leibniz might have been the most important thinker in the history of mankind?Then, you should read this book. Actually, if you love a ripping yarn that (incidentally, mind you) teaches you all about the above mentioned things, then you should read Quicksilver (and its sequels, which are even better). Highly recommended for the self-selecting people who probably realize that they should read it.

This is the second Neal Stephenson book I have read. I had once started Snow Crash but didn't care for it. I bought Seveneves last year on a $1.99 Kindle Daily Deal just in case, and since it's sci-fi I gave it a try a couple weeks ago. I couldn't put it down and now I've finished Quicksilver this morning and am well started on The Confusion. That's how good I think Neal Stephenson is. I'm not getting his description of The Baroque Cycle as sci-fi yet, but I've got two big books yet to go. Thank goodness.The funny thing is, I don't care at all for dialogue and exposition. I'm an action fan in sci-fi and epic fantasy. But I'm finding myself hurrying through the action parts of Quicksilver and settling in again when the dialogues start up once more. His characterizations are brilliant.

I've read two Neil Stephenson books before, Cryptonomicon, which I loved, and Seveneves, which I liked a lot. But this Quicksilver book just left me baffled. I think I got maybe half way through before calling it quits, and even that involved some serious speed reading. The premise was kind of intriguing - mostly following the character Daniel Waterhouse, as he encounters the natural philosophers of the day, mostly noticeably Issac Newton. It was clear Stephenson did some serious historic and cultural research for this book, so I feel bad giving it for me a negative review. Maybe I just simply lack the appropriate attention span, but while each page was kind of interesting on it's own, I just didn't know what I was supposed to be taking from this novel, or where it was heading. The was never an issue with Cryptonomicon or Seveneves. I should mention that this is really 3 books stuck together, with numbers 1&3 sharing the same lead character, so it's truly a brick of a book. I bought this book because I really liked the author, and Amazon was offering it for only 2 bucks. Now I see why.

Neal Stephenson is a master storyteller who never fails to deliver the goods, and Quicksilver is no exception. If you're familiar with Stephenson's high-tech adventures (e.g., Cryptonomicon, Snow Crash, Zodiac), or those set in alternate/older times (e.g., Diamond Age), you will find Quicksilver a refreshing take on American, English, and French "history" circa late 1600's, where technology and reason begin to challenge the status quo (e.g., religion, royalty, etc). Quicksilver is entertaining (to say the least), informative (you'll probably learn a ton, as I did), and extremely funny in parts -- I think Stephenson's works are really under-rated in this respect. If you've read this far, do yourself a favor: read Quicksilver!

I loved Anathema and was delighted to see there was a sizeable series to get my teeth into. I was disappointed. I couldn't see what the connection between some of the aspects was meant to be, and the lengthy establishment of the character Enoch at the beginning came to nothing. The story picked up pace a bit when Eliza appeared, but again it seem disconnected to the whole. I didn't spot the promised comedic moments. I was left with the impression that I'd read a lot of writing, some of which was very good, but not a book.

I am struggling to write this review as I do not whether to recommend reading the book or not. It was a very clever book but I found it almost too clever and often had to revisit pages to try and understand the relevance of the text. It concerned lots of different characters and flicked backwards and forwards in time and had lots of different story lines all going on at the same time.The historical aspects is what drew me to the book in the first pace and I think that is what kept me reading to the end. I did not dislike it nor particularly like it and felt a sense of achievement and relief at reaching the end. I may allow a suitable gap before starting Book 2.

I originally tried to read this book when it was first published, and failed. I recently purchased it on Kindle and have just completed all 3 volumes of the Baroque Cycle ... and loved it. An astounding story with a scope stretching around the world and covering more than half a century during a time of huge change - economically, scientifically and politically. You probably already know of many of the characters, but NS weaves them in a fantastic story told in many different styles. In part, it reminds me of Life and TImes of Tristram Shandy, while other parts are picaresque and some sections are epistolaric, and may others in between. There are parts which remind me of the epic novels of John Barth, particularly where one of the main characters, Jack Shaftoe, features in stories being related with in the main narrative. The Baroque Cylce is a huge achievement, particularly since it is a fantastic and fun read.

I struggled with this and have currently put it down having read only about a quarter of it and I'm not sure I am going to pick it up again. Perhaps I should persevere but I can't see where this is going, its all a bit tedious with long descriptions of what life might of been like in the period it is set.

It irritates me intensely that Stephenson's Baroque Cycle is frequently classed as Science Fiction, even in bookshops. It is quite straightforward Historical Fiction (or Faction as it mixes real with imagined characters). It seems if you write one SF novel in your life, you are forever tainted with that label! This cycle of books will appeal to anyone interested in history, particularly the history of ideas. Stephenson's great talent, also evidenced in his Cryptonomecon, is his ability to infiltrate a surprisingly deep and sophisticated educational experience into a really good novel.I have just finished reading the complete cycle again and for the first time in order (more than two thousand pages in total). It is a stonking good read, with only the odd page or six tending to drag a little. It is easy to say it needs an editor, but the problem is that an editor would probably cut far too much, and the wrong bits. Stephenson can make a conversation about philosophy between two princesses in a garden into a really exciting page-turner, but his action passages tend to drag badly. These can feel like a scene-by-scene description by a nine-year-old boy of a movie he's just watched!Stephenson's trick is to tell the story from the perspective of three invented characters who have a modern outlook on life (while not being glaringly anachronistic). This enables him to render characters like Leibnitz and Newton accurately as only partly modern figures (Newton is an alchemist and Leibnitz something of a religious obscurantist), whilst allowing them to be viewed and interpreted by characters we can identify with. Contrast this with John Banville's frankly unreadable novels about Copernicus, Newton and Kepler in which the accurately rendered thought processes typical of the times are alien and incomprehensible to the modern reader. We forget that science has selected the stuff these early scientists got right and edited out whole bodies of nonsense.Read these books for their exciting narrative, great characterisation and lovely, flip humour. But you will find that you have absorbed an amazing amount of knowledge, both traditional historical knowledge and also the foundations of modern science and capitalism. This experience left me viciously angry about the lousy standard of history teaching in schools. When I was taught this period, nothing happened that did not involve the British, and history was the tedious machinations of kings, politicians and religious nutters. Stephenson's history is global in scope and unashamedly emphasises the origins of the ideas that have lasted to shape the modern world.