The Baroque Cycle

The Baroque Cycle follows Daniel Waterhouse, Jack Shaftoe and Eliza through the political, scientific and financial transformation of Europe between the Restoration and the Hanoverian succession. Historical figures including Isaac Newton, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and Louis XIV share the narrative with fictional natural philosophers, soldiers, spies, merchants and courtiers.

Across Quicksilver, The Confusion and The System of the World, discoveries in mathematics and experimental science develop beside new forms of credit, global trade, cryptography and state power. The trilogy also acts as a historical prequel to Cryptonomicon, connecting the origins of modern computing, finance and information warfare to the families and institutions that reappear centuries later.