immolooki.blogg.se - Quicksilver

Perhaps have characters who are the ancestors of Lawrence Waterhouse and Bobby Shaftoe?

The soldier and scientist dynamic between Waterhouse and Shaftoe worked so well in Cryptonomicon that I’d like to do something similar here.

Here are some of the top ideas I’m mulling over: It was an amazing time with huge changes in politics, culture, commerce and science, but there was just so much going on that I can’t seem to make up my mind and pick one or two concepts for the book. I know that I want do something set during the late 17th century in Europe.

The issue is that I have far too many ideas, and I can’t decide which plot to use for my next book. (The following is an excerpt from the journal of Neal Stephenson.)Īfter the success of Cryptonomicon, I’m having some problems narrowing down my next project.

edition includes 16 pages of supplementary materials.Ĭover illustration from the Mary Evans Picture Library painting of Great Fire of London on stepback It is a chronicle of the breathtaking exploits of "Half-Cocked Jack" Shaftoe-London street urchin turned swashbuckling adventurer and legendary King of the Vagabonds-risking life and limb for fortune and love while slowly maddening from the pox.Īnd it is the tale of Eliza, rescued by Jack from a Turkish harem to become spy, confidante, and pawn of royals in order to reinvent Europe through the newborn power of finance.Ī gloriously rich, entertaining, and endlessly inventive novel that brings a remarkable age and its momentous events to vivid life, Quicksilver is an extraordinary achievement from one of the most original and important literary talents of our time. Quicksilver is the story of Daniel Waterhouse, fearless thinker and conflicted Puritan, pursuing knowledge in the company of the greatest minds of Baroque-era Europe, in a chaotic world where reason wars with the bloody ambitions of the mighty, and where catastrophe, natural or otherwise, can alter the political landscape overnight.