Odalisque (Quicksilver, Part 3) » (Reprint)

A decade after novelist William Gibson coined the term virtual reality, Neal Stephenson burst onto the science fiction scene with Snow Crash, his own manic take on the interface between man and machine. More recently, the cyberpunk visionary has turned his sights away from the future of technology, and toward the question of how and why it arose the way it did.

The trials of Dr. Daniel Waterhouse and the Natural Philosophers increase one hundredfold in an England plagued by the impending war and royal insecurities — as the beautiful and ambitious Eliza plays a most dangerous game as double agent and confidante of enemy kings.

Independent

“Dense, witty, erudite ... and gripping ... a far more impressive literary endeavor than most so-called “serious” fiction.”

The trials of Dr. Daniel Waterhouse and the Natural Philosophers increase one hundredfold in an England plagued by the impending war and royal insecurities -- as the beautiful and ambitious Eliza plays a most dangerous game as double agent and confidante of enemy kings.