![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Book Review
Oct. 13th, 2010 10:18 pmThe Confusion
by Neal Stephenson
This was the second book in The Baroque Cycle, and it was in some ways even more fun than the first, while still being just as brainy and thought-provoking. This volume covered the 1690s and is organized in the form of two interleaved stories. One story follows Eliza as she travels around France, England, and Germany, pursuing various financial and political machinations as well as maintaining her friendships with various intellectual figures, Leibniz chief among them. The other story concerns Half-Cocked Jack and his cabal of former galley slaves as they pursue treasure and profit across South and East Asia, and Central America and run into intrigue along the way. There are various subtle connections and parallels between the two stories that pull the book together.
The Confusion is a lot more of an adventure story than its predecessor. In fact, it is in some ways like an enlargement of the middle section of Quicksilver. Maybe that's why I liked it so much. I really love the characters of Jack and Eliza. Jack is a brazen, occasionally impetuous, swashbuckling vagabond who nevertheless retains a kind heart and humane soul as he swings between the poles of fortune and misfortune. In Eliza, Stephenson has created an extremely complete female character. She has her own fully-formed ideas, goals, thoughts, feeling, etc.. I especially like the way Stephenson makes her a woman of her time without letting general stereotypes of women or historical realities hamstring or confine her. Eliza can be a master manipulator of trade and finance and a competent political intriguer without being portrayed as an anomaly. She also is able to fit into her social milieu and have a family, friends, and lovers.
The Confusion is much less concerned with early science and the major political events of the day than Quicksilver. It's main focus is on the emergence of modern ways of generating and handling wealth, as well as the way the world and trade expanded in the late 17th century. I have a feeling that the third and final book in the series is going to tie the concerns of the first two books together. I also suspect that the overall form of the trilogy is going to end up mirroring that of the first book.
by Neal Stephenson
This was the second book in The Baroque Cycle, and it was in some ways even more fun than the first, while still being just as brainy and thought-provoking. This volume covered the 1690s and is organized in the form of two interleaved stories. One story follows Eliza as she travels around France, England, and Germany, pursuing various financial and political machinations as well as maintaining her friendships with various intellectual figures, Leibniz chief among them. The other story concerns Half-Cocked Jack and his cabal of former galley slaves as they pursue treasure and profit across South and East Asia, and Central America and run into intrigue along the way. There are various subtle connections and parallels between the two stories that pull the book together.
The Confusion is a lot more of an adventure story than its predecessor. In fact, it is in some ways like an enlargement of the middle section of Quicksilver. Maybe that's why I liked it so much. I really love the characters of Jack and Eliza. Jack is a brazen, occasionally impetuous, swashbuckling vagabond who nevertheless retains a kind heart and humane soul as he swings between the poles of fortune and misfortune. In Eliza, Stephenson has created an extremely complete female character. She has her own fully-formed ideas, goals, thoughts, feeling, etc.. I especially like the way Stephenson makes her a woman of her time without letting general stereotypes of women or historical realities hamstring or confine her. Eliza can be a master manipulator of trade and finance and a competent political intriguer without being portrayed as an anomaly. She also is able to fit into her social milieu and have a family, friends, and lovers.
The Confusion is much less concerned with early science and the major political events of the day than Quicksilver. It's main focus is on the emergence of modern ways of generating and handling wealth, as well as the way the world and trade expanded in the late 17th century. I have a feeling that the third and final book in the series is going to tie the concerns of the first two books together. I also suspect that the overall form of the trilogy is going to end up mirroring that of the first book.
