King of the Vagabonds (Neal Stephenson) 4* rollicking good ride of where-the-hell-are-we-going?!

[livingbyfiction]

Reading a Neal Stephenson book is like stumbling around a mad scientist's laboratory: the place is dangerously alive.  The uneven floors are strewn with odd-looking bones, machines from the future, and loquacious imps arguing over semiotics.  Strange-colored fires explode out of nowhere.  No narrative arc, though.

King of the Vagabonds is unusual

Comments

[texile]

All the plot elements you list also happen in the first 3 books. Now I am curious about what this new book is up to and will have to check it out. After I finish Spin. You are an enabler of my fiction addiction.

[livingbyfiction]

Eh? Are you becoming a cat lady with book deja vu? If we count the Baroque Cycle as 8 novels (even though Silly Stephenson calls it 3 "books" each consisting of 2 or 3 stand-alone novel-length volumes), King of the Vagabonds is book 2 of 8. Unless you mean the "first 3 books" you read by Neal Stephenson because, come to think of it, this is not the first time a harpoon has been thrown.

I'm trying to decide which, if any, further books to read in the series. I'm convinced that I'll be disappointed if I read everything (the middle two books called "The Confusion" certainly sound ominous). Odalisque sounds pretty good, but after carefully checking the spoiler-free reviews, I've confirmed that Odalisque is all Eliza, Daniel Waterhouse, and Leibniz (but no Jack). I've never met Daniel, but he sounds like a no-fun Massachusetts dude with a hat. I just want to know if Jack becomes a pirate.

[texile]

I am probably a cat lady with book deja vu, but in this case it is cool- I think of it as 3 largish books, so I have in fact read King of the Vagabonds. I rather like Daniel and Leibniz, but I have no recommendations as I tore through the books in a mindless binge, which I think is how they were meant to be consumed.