The follow-on book from Quicksilver. Continues the story of the characters and continues the historic setting. More fanciful than the first volume, with the lead characters improbably escaping from a life as galley slaves to steal gold and go off around the world righting wrongs - but still a wonderful read. Read October 2008. ( )

Title is accurate. But you have to get through it to read System of the World, so suck it up. ( )

I am entirely perplexed by this trilogy! Usually by the time I have read the first book in a trilogy - let alone the second - I know well whether I am intending to keep the series for an indulgent re-read in the future. After reading the first book, I had been intrigued enough to read the second but felt that overall I would be discarding the series.

What a difference a book makes! Over the course of this second book, I found myself musing on the story even while I was not reading about the continued adventures of Eliza and Jack. This book is reward for struggling through the first, which was enormously dense and detailed.

The book is shared between Eliza (Juncto) and Jack (Bonanza), their stories intertwining. We find Jack alive and well, and free from the French pox (syphilis). He has been captured by Barbary pirates and his tale involves a convoluted plot between him and other members of the Cabal - to capture a shipment of gold that will lead to their fortunes being made. His story leads him across the world - through the Far East and finally taking a dangerous trip to Acapulco. The capture of the gold has massive repercussions across the world, affecting many including Eliza, who starts her story being waylaid by Jean Bart and carried back to France, where she once again begins manipulating trade.

This time both stories are equally gripping for one reason or another, and the skipping between both allows Stephenson to develop two different tones - the formal, slow burning plot of Eliza and the swashbuckling adventures of Jack Shaftoe.

Many, many characters take centre stage here and become beloved to the reader over the course of 800 pages. Obviously Jack and Eliza will have the attention of the reader, but there is also Leibniz (the dignified and friendly Natural Philosopher who has befriended Eliza from the beginning); Bob Shaftoe (brother of Jack, more upright and stolid); Princess Caroline (beautiful and fiercely intelligent); and the many entertaining members of the Cabal.

We also see the beginnings of Minerva - the ship that is carrying Daniel Waterhouse back to England at the start of the first book in the trilogy - and meet her captain van Hoek (a Dutch captain who feels the need to shed body parts when in gravest danger).

Altogether I am being overwhelmed gradually by the trilogy of books, and can find much to love about them. On the flipside, the writing is still inpenetrable at times and leaves me feeling confused as to what is actually occuring. At times the pacing of the story is woeful - leaving spells where I actually avoid picking up the book, although curiosity in the fates of Jack and Eliza always brings me back.

I would tentatively recommend this book to everyone I know - with the proviso that it is still not *easy* reading (and that they have to suffer through book one to reach the heights of book two). ( )

Neal Stephenson is absolutely awesome as always. If this guy rights a book about cheese I will read it too, because I think anything he rights about becomes a great read. ( )

The second installment in Neal Stephenson’s massive Baroque Cycle, i.e. The Confusion, concentrates on the exploits of Jack Shaftoe and his merry band of multiculti galley slaves, as they both make plays and are played all around the known world in the late 17th century. The adventures of the series’ other two main characters – i.e. Daniel Waterhouse the natural philosopher, and Eliza the Duchess of various parts who’s also a hot babe/financial genius – are downplayed when compared to the Cycle’s first volume, Quicksilver.

Given this shift of emphasis to Jack, the book is actually more coherent and easy to follow, especially since there are few new characters introduced on the European stage. But since I found the picaresque exploits of Jack Shaftoe the least interesting of this series’ main storylines, I enjoyed The Confusion perhaps a bit less than Quicksilver, even though it was easier to read.

Never the less, several episodes in the adventures of Jack’s own little cabal stand out: their encounters in India and Japan are especially good fun. Much less interesting is the book’s rather interminable section in the New World; Stephenson seems to lose his narrative energy here, as if he felt he had to throw in some adventures in Spanish-colonial Mexico just to get his main characters across the western hemisphere and back over to Europe.

This series isn’t for everyone, but since I’m still finding the frequent asides on subjects ranging from science and technology to shipbuilding and navigation to money and banking highly diverting and indeed instructive, I’m looking forward very much to finishing off the cycle with volume III. ( )

I'm continuing the Baroque Cycle with "Book 4: Bonanza" which is paired with "Book 5: Juncto" in The Confusion (2004) by Neal Stephenson. This shows how stubborn I am to read one book at a time since Bonanza is "confused" together with Juncto making for a lot of page flipping.

Bonanza is all Jack Shaftoe as he connives to escape slavery and make a fortune in gold in an around the world adventure. Jack and his polyglot cabal of escaped galley slaves travel through Algiers, Egypt, India, the Phillipines, China, Mexico, and the mysterious land of Qwghlm over a dozen years. Topics covered include global commerce, colonialism, religious conflict, the Inquisition, Jesuits, alchemy, piracy, shipbuilding, metallurgy, numismatics, vulgarity, and slapstick humor.

Despite the adventure, I didn't feel as engaged with this book as the earlier ones. It all seems to be leading somewhere - with tangents - but I'm not enjoying the ride as much. I should have read it mixed-up with Eliza's book Juncto. I'll find out soon when I read that book in the coming weeks.

By the way, I have to give credit to Vermeer's Hat for covering the Manilla trade which involved Chinese merchants living in the outskirts of that city and an annual sailing of a galleon from New Spain bearing silver bullion. This was a good background for many of the events in Bonanza.

The Confusion (2004) by Neal Stephenson continues with Book 5 of The Baroque Cycle, "The Juncto." This book is all Eliza, with a good share of Bob Shaftoe, plus helpings of Daniel Waterhouse and Leibniz, sprinkled with the monarchy and aristocracy of late 17th-century Europe, both real and fiction. At times the narrative of this book appears to be no more than a roundabout way of telling the history of banking, finance, numismatics, and cryptology. Despite all this, "The Juncto" is much more lively, entertaining, and funny than it's intertwined book "Bonanza." Of course, maybe if I read them together like I was supposed to I would not be making these comparisons. And it would have made a whole lot more sense. ( )

The second massive volume in Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle is The Confusion (Morrow, 2004) (my review for the first volume, Quicksilver, is here). Only slightly less voluminous than its predecessor (815 pages compared to 927), The Confusion is, I promise, just as complicated and just as bizarre.

There are two major plot-lines in this volume (amid millions of smaller ones): in the first, Jack Shaftoe (whose resemblance to Disney's Jack Sparrow continues here) and his Cabal - a motley crew of misfits if ever there was one - manage to escape from slavery, capture a treasure, lose said treasure, recapture said treasure, lose said treasure again, get captured again, &c. as they meander their way around the world. In the second plot-line (Stephenson has designed the volume with alternating sections - con-fusing them, as it were - so the reader bounces back and forth between the two with some regularity) we find our old friends Leibniz and Waterhouse, Eliza (now a duchess twice over, with a few children under her skirts), Sophie the Electress of Hanover, and all their assorted associates and hangers-on. They're mucking about with the politics and finances of Europe, par usual.

I mostly enjoyed the book, but it's hard not to get bogged down in Stephenson's minutiae, and I found myself frustrated at times, not particularly caring what happened to any of the characters. But I slogged through, and in fact the last few chapters did make the book well worth reading. I'll get to the third volume ... someday.

http://philobiblos.blogspot.com/2008/... ( )

As often happens with Neal Stephenson books, I had the sneaking suspicion throughout the series that I'm not quite smart enough to really understand everything that's going on, but I still had a rip-roaring great time reading this book. The characters are typical Stephenson characters (he often has the self-deprecating, adventurous, dumb-yet-geeky male and the witty, hyper-intelligent, sexy, manipulative female - I can't help but think these are two sides of Stephenson's own personality). I love the science fiction approach to historical fiction. Really amazing stuff. ( )

Continuing the series, this is the most difficult volume. It gets rather slow at times, and sometimes only the memory of the high points keeps you going. But there are enough high points, especially involving the man Jack Sparrow wanted to be - Half Cocked Jack - to make it worth some minor frustration.

Don't worry, the payoff and gratification makes it worth every bit. In fact, the good bits are better than any other author I can think of having read.

It might take a bit of courage (yes, this whole series is monstrously large), but dig in and go for it. Where else are you going to learn all of these obscure historical tidbits, eh? ( )

The moment I finished Quicksilver, I felt compelled to literally run to the neighborhood bookstore to buy this book, the second volume of the Baroque Cycle. It picks up where Quicksilver left off, in media rea, as Homer would say. Some of our beloved characters have gone their separate ways by now- will they find each other again? Will they survive in a world that seems determined to kill everyone? That sounds kind of like a soap opera, and in a certain sense, it is. Only instead of pool boys and ex-wives, you have kings and mistresses.

Academics at each others' throats, poisonings, insane economic gambles, pirates, and world explorations all await within these pages. Man, I'm making myself want to read this series all over again. ( )

The next book in the Baroque Cycle trilogy. Entertaining, the first book was more surprising, this time I felt sometimes some tiredness coming up when Jack finds himself once again in another unbelievable adventure. But nevertheless, a great read. ( )

Luckily this book is not confusing, as the title suggests. In good literary style, the title refers to an older meaning; con-fused, or joined together. Through the journeys of its characters, particularly one who makes an eastward journey from India to London, Stephenson shows how the lines of trade connect and join the globe, even in 1700... http://icantstopreading.wordpress.com... ( )

http://www.schlaikjer.net/reviews/170... ( )

http://nhw.livejournal.com/111019.htm...

If you liked Cryptonomicon and Quicksilver, and I did, you'll like this as well. Qualifies as sf only on the Damon Knight principle. Set in Europe between 1689 and 1704 with most of it concentrated towards the first three years of that period. I thought actually better than Quicksilver, with more imaginative use of settings including Mediterranean, India, and Spanish America. Good stuff. ( )

The Confusion is the best of the Baroque Cycle, as the middle of series tend to be, and worth slogging through Quicksilver to get to it. The financial wrangling of Eliza can be hard to follow at time, but the exploits of Jack "L'Emmerdeur" Shaftoe are great fun. This whole series is not quite as good as Cryptonomicon, mostly because it's a bit more confusing and hard to follow (there's just a lot going on), but still better than most of what's out there. ( )

ok. i confess i've started this series about four times. i don't know if it's the work or just my life, but the book always ends up only a chapter or two into it, languishing on the bedside. ( )

A good way to describe this book is like this; I was flying somewhere and a dude next to me saw me reading this book and complemented me. He had also been slogging his way through the cycle. You have to love history, economics, and Stephenson (not in that order). Read Cryptonomicon first, please. ( )

http://pasquires.net/reviews/books/th... ( )

Worth the Weight: "The Confusion" is the second weighty volume in Neal Stephenson's gigantic "Baroque Cycle." "Quicksilver" (2003) got the Cycle off to a solid (if slow) start, and if the concluding volume ("The System of the World," to be published in the fall of 2004) is anything like "The Confusion," it will be a story worthy of its size. Neal Stephenson comes through on this volume, and those of us who were concerned by "Quicksilver" can give a sigh of relief.

"The Confusion" covers the years 1689-1702 and consists of two interlocking books, "Bonanza" and "The Juncto." Since events in each book influence those in the other, they are con-fused so that the volume as a whole is less confusing; we switch back and forth between the two books, reading a few chapters in one before turning to the other. The approach works well. Instead of jumping back to 1689 in the middle of the volume, the whole story unfolds more or less chronologically. There are occasionally gaps of an entire year or two in the narrative, which is a little disconcerting, but helps to keep the plot moving.

At the beginning of "Bonanza," we rejoin Jack Shaftoe, King of the Vagabonds, some four years after he was enslaved by the Barbary Corsairs. A fever has cured his pox and restored his sanity, but at the same time removed all his memories of the past four years. Jack learns that he is part of a group of galley slaves - the Cabal - plotting to steal a boatload of silver from the Spanish and use part of the proceeds to buy their freedom. There is only one problem: the silver they capture turns out to be gold. Even worse, this gold has incredible alchemical powers - or, at least, so the alchemists believe. Terrified that their alchemical gold will be spent and thus con-fused with the common metal, the Esoteric Brotherhood will pursue the Cabal to the ends of the earth to get it back - or, failing that, to get revenge.

Eliza, meanwhile, has involuntarily donated her considerable fortune to the French war effort after being captured by privateer Jean Bart while fleeing to England . As she tries to recover, the European economy is thrown into confusion by a series of bad loans and bad harvests coupled with the seemingly endless wars that have sucked up all of the continent's money. Eliza, along with "The Juncto," a powerful group of English politicians, has the task of rebuilding Europe 's financial system on the basis of trade, laying the groundwork for modern economics. Her task is not made any easier by the alchemists, who know of her connection to Jack Shaftoe, and hope to get to him through her.

As I hoped, I found "The Confusion" more entertaining than "Quicksilver." The pace is much quicker, and the action and actual plot development makes the volume much more engrossing. I occasionally got the feeling that more happened in particular scenes in "The Confusion" (for example, the Duc d'Arcachon's birthday party) than in the whole of "Quicksilver." There's still plenty of interesting errata (as we expect in a Stephenson book), though Daniel Waterhouse is largely missing - he doesn't appear until about 2/3rds of the way through the volume, and scampers off to Massachusetts pretty quickly after that. Finally, the conclusion does a wonderful job setting up the final volume; I can hardly wait until it's out.

Those who have made their way through "Quicksilver" owe it to themselves to move onto "The Confusion" so that their efforts can be rewarded. If you were hesitant about starting "The Baroque Cycle" after reading mixed reviews of the first volume, you can rest assured that "The Confusion" makes it all worthwhile. If "The System of the World" is up to the standard set by "The Confusion" (and I suspect it will be), "The Baroque Cycle" will end up as a masterpiece of massive historical fiction. ( )

http://www.sfrevu.com/ISSUES/2004/040... ( )

The term ‘confusion’ can connote many things. It usually indicates a state of bewilderment. It also denotes a jumbled and chaotic time or place, a disjointed mingling of disparate elements and events that appear to have little in relation to each other.

It is, in other words, a perfect one-word summation of our world at the later end of the seventeenth century. It was a time of tremendous upheaval in numerous aspects of civilization, a period of intellect and innovation that many expected would lead to a new age of enlightenment.

Leave it to American author Neal Stephenson to make a rollicking pirate novel of it all.

The Confusion, Stephenson’s superlative second volume in his trilogy The Baroque Cycle, is, indeed, a confusion of high adventure, international intrigue, scientific discourse, and economic chaos. Stephenson even throws in math, cryptology, and the precursor to the modern computer, just in case he might be accused of narrative laziness.

Building on events outlined in Quicksilver, Stephenson wastes no time in thrusting the reader into the thick of things. Familiarity with the preceding novel is essential, as he has too much to write about without the additional bothersome worry of exposition. When you write of people who, “in a single grammatically correct sentence, [manage] to make reference to Apolonius of Perga, the Folium of Descartes, and the Limacon of Pascal�, back-story is so much wasted ink.

Jack Shaftoe, King of the Vagabonds, is now a galley slave in Algiers, plotting with his fellow oarsmen (a mixed bag of Irish, Jewish, Russian, and Arabic men, plus one wayward samurai) to buy themselves free from servitude through an ingenious scheme. Hijacking a ship laden with Spanish gold, Shaftoe finds himself again in the thick of world events, sailing around the globe in search of wealth, fame, and his true love.

Meanwhile, in a second tale ‘con-fused’ with the first, former slave and peerless spy Eliza continues to quietly subvert the economies of Europe, working behind the scenes as England attempts to wage war with France with no financial support. Unlike Shaftoe’s bizarre exploits in India and beyond, Eliza finds herself in a changing world “where power came of thrift and cleverness and industry, not of birthright, and certainly not of Divine Right.�

Stephenson, a former science-fiction writer, has produced a seamless blend of historical fact and riotous fiction as vivid and imaginative as anything the great fantasists could ever dream up. His is a dazzling world of visionaries and treachery, an epoch of intellectual rebellion and cultural revolution that our planet has never again seen the like of.

It’s a confusing story to be sure, but Stephenson has a sure hand at keeping the flow steady, never getting bogged down in details. His effort is stunning at times, with a poignant cliffhanger ending that provides both closure and excitement for the upcoming final volume.
Eliza describes confusion as “a kind of bewitchment – a moment when what we supposed we understood loses its form and runs together and becomes one with other things that, though they might have had different outward forms, shared the same inward nature.� By this definition, Stephenson has produced an epic confusion of his own, a clash of styles and themes that frustrates, enchants, and ultimately astounds. ( )

http://steevc.multiply.com/reviews/it... ( )