reading matters

[Lawrence Bryan]

I gave up on the book after about 100 pages or so. Stevenson  was  
starting to come across as a bit of a show off, something that started  
with Cryptonomicon (sp?), where there, at least, the technological  
erudition wasn't so pervasive.

Lawrence

On Aug 5, 2008, at 1:42 PM, Graham Croft wrote:

> http://januarymagazine.com/fiction/quicksilver.html
>
> This is link to a 2003 review of the first book of a trilogy that  
> came out some time ago set i the early days of the formation of the  
> Royal Society and written by Neal Stevenson.
>
> Like Pynchon this guy comes from a science rather than a lit  
> background and his portrait of Newton is a delight - though his  
> optical experiments require a strong stomach. The books suggest an  
> obsessive delight in research (though as I don't share this myself  
> I'm guessing as to the accuracy of the historic architecture; what  
> ~I do know of the period meshes) and a real feel for the minutiae of  
> circumstance - one of the many things that make Gravity's Rainbow  
> such a prodigiously believable excursion into a landscape of mania.
>
> Newton's fascination with and respect for the occult sciences gets a  
> proper hearing here, and the portrayal of the academic and  
> governmental politics of the time should satisfy the most demanding  
> paranoia.
>
> And if you like the first one - there are two more.
>
>