Summer Reading

I have been reading a lot of Dudley Pope's Ramage novels lately, which are fantastic if you are a fan of Napoleonic naval battles or of a similar style of writing as C.S. Forester's Horatio Hornblower series. There is a great used bookstore near me that has the entire series in great condition for only a few bucks a novel. I've gone through the first three so far, and plan on picking up some more this week.

I've also started re-reading Neil Stephenson's "The Baroque Cycle" trilogy again, with the first of the books: Quicksilver. This is some pretty extensive reading (made jury duty that much more tolerable the last go-round!) but worth it if you are a fan of science fiction, historical fiction, metaphysics, court intrigues, battles, and even pirates.

According to the description on the author's site:

Baroque Cycle Volume 1:
Quicksilver
In this wonderfully inventive follow-up to his bestseller Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson brings to life a cast of unforgettable characters in a time of breathtaking genius and discovery, men and women whose exploits defined an age known as the Baroque.

Daniel Waterhouse possesses a brilliant scientific mind -- and yet knows that his genius is dwarfed by that of his friends Isaac Newton, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, and Robert Hooke. He rejects the arcane tradition of alchemy, even as it is giving birth to new ways of understanding the world.

Jack Shaftoe began his life as a London street urchin and is now a reckless wanderer in search of great fortune. The intrepid exploits of Half-Cocked Jack, King of the Vagabonds, are quickly becoming the stuff of legend throughout Europe.

Eliza is a young woman whose ingenuity is all that keeps her alive after being set adrift from the Turkish harem in which she has been imprisoned since she was a child.

Daniel, Jack, and Eliza will traverse a landscape populated by mad alchemists, Barbary pirates, and bawdy courtiers, as well as historical figures including Samuel Pepys, Ben Franklin, and other great minds of the age. Traveling from the infant American colonies to the Tower of London to the glittering courts of Louis XIV, and all manner of places in between, this magnificent historical epic brings to vivid life a time like no other, and establishes its author as one of the preeminent talents of our own age.

Locus Magazine conducted an interview with author Neil Stephenson after he completed the Baroque Cycle. Read it here. I have read several other of his books at this point and would really recommend him as a writer if you are into fairly complex and intriguing story lines that branch out into quite a few different subject matters. His characters are also well-rounded and the time periods (of the historical novels at any rate) appear to be meticulously researched. Definitely one of the better historical and science ficiton writers currently working today, in my opinion. Go to his personal website here.