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The System Of The World
The Baroque Cycle, Vol. 3
by Neal Stephenson

8.8 based on 12 reviews read critic reviews how did we calculate this? based on 9 votes read user comments rate this book

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The final installment in Stephenson's massive Baroque Cycle trilogy begins in the year 1714.

William Morrow & Company, 912 pages
10/01/2004
$27.95

ISBN: 0060523875

Fiction
Historical Fiction
Science Fiction & Fantasy

All reviews are classified as one of five grades: Outstanding (4 points), Favorable (3), Mixed (2), Unfavorable (1) and Terrible (0). To calculate the Metascore, we divide total points achieved by the total points possible (i.e., 4 x the number of reviews), with the resulting percentage (multiplied by 100) being the Metascore. Learn more...

Entertainment Weekly John Giuffo

Self-indulgent ambition disguised as historical fiction was never this much fun--or this successful.

Kirkus Reviews

Learned, violent, sarcastic, and profound: a glorious finish to one of the most ambitious epics of recent years. [1 Sep 2004]

Library Journal Jackie Cassada

Stands out as a masterwork of time, place, and people. [15 Sep 2004, p.51]

Publishers Weekly

Another magnificent portrayal of an era, well worth the long slog it requires of Stephenson's many devoted readers. [13 Sep 2004, p.57]

Salon Andrew Leonard

There is more method to Stephenson's madness in these tomes than in any of his previous works. By the end, one realizes that in many cases what once seemed a foray into insubstantial irrelevance was a carefully placed foundation stone.

San Francisco Chronicle Michael Berry

It takes a lot of work to keep up with all the machinations, but there are plenty of payoffs for readers who remain sufficiently alert as the page count marches toward four digits.

Los Angeles Times John Brewer

At his best Stephenson captures the inventiveness, speculative mania, political divisiveness, rapid change, casual cruelty and dizzy invention of the age. At his worst his scenes are reminiscent of Martin Scorsese's "Gangs of New York" -- hypersensitive to detail, yet somehow lifeless because of their obsessive verisimilitude. [26 Sep 2004, p.R6]

The Guardian Jon Courtenay Grimwood

Many think Cryptonomicon Stephenson's best book. The System of the World is better; although having to read Quicksilver and Confusion to reach the 900-page punch line makes heavy demands on the reader.

Booklist Brad Hooper

Obviously--given the book's length--details are profuse, but each detail speedily draws readers into the narrative rather than impeding it. [15 Sep 2004, p.180]

Village Voice Douglas Wolk

It's a grand, if slow, entertainment most of the way, but when Stephenson tries to freight it with a still grander significance, it crumples like a periwig beneath a carriage wheel.

Washington Post Gregory Feeley

Despite its frenzied complications and watch-me-top-this ingenuity -- much of it funny and some of it genuinely moving -- "The System of the World" is continually asking to be rendered down to its essence, a rather bald set of assertions for 892 pages.

The Globe And Mail [Toronto] John Burns

There's something for everyone to like, and to hate. [16 Oct 2004, p.D13]

The average user rating for this book is 8.8 (out of 10) based on 9 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Matthew P gave it a10:
Having just finished Neal Stephensons's Baroque Cycle, my initial impression is one of regret - regret that the story had come to an end. Along with the Lord of the Rings and possibly a couple of other books and series, this is one of the few that I will be re-reading, likely more than once. In fact, after reading the novels Quicksilver, King of the Vagabonds and Odalesque, I found that I needed to read them again before diving into The Confusion and The System of the World. Now that I've finished I am inclined to explore the entire work again right away. Of course, there were parts that I liked better than others, but Neal's way with words keeps me interested even during the slow parts and he is one of only a handful of writers who can repeatedly make me laugh out loud while reading his prose. On another level, his usually understated description of the deep and intense emotional experiences suffered by his characters, particularly Jack, Eliza and Daniel, reveal his deep understanding of the human condition as it is influenced by place, culture and events while also illustrating the natural resilience that people posess to rise above the common level when necessary no matter what their gifts or handicaps may be. This echoes his characters in Cryptonomicron. The obvious relational ties really make this a part of the same opus. If you enjoy immersion in a real (though imagined) world of real (though fictional) people with a generous dash of deep thought, interesting history and wry social comment thrown in, not to mention frequent humor, then I highly recommend the Baroque Cycle. Personally, I agree with J.R.R. Tolkien's remarks on the Lord of the Rings, that it should have been longer, and this is also true to Mr. Stephenson's tale. Perhaps he is not finished yet....

Pat M gave it a10:
This series is on my top ten best books ever list. Challanging, entertaining: requires a brain to read. Excellent!

brian w gave it a10:
incredibly smart and fun

Mark S gave it an8:
Good, but slow. Plot works out but he doesn't ever get up to the same level of enthusiam as in the previous 2 books. Usually, by page 400, things are in riotous full gear for the rest of the book.

Stone J gave it a9:
Early on in The System of the World, Daniel Waterhouse laments that his panoramic life has had "[t]oo many threads, and too much information for his stiff old brain to cope with." One suspects this is also Neal Stephenson's sly jab at the reader, who has an equally confounding task at hand. One year, two volumes, and some three thousand pages later (reportedly all written in longhand), the American author wraps up The Baroque Cycle, his epic opus to the complete overhaul of modern thinking. True to form, he completes it in all its dumbfounding, anachronistic, mercurial glory. It is a Lord of the Rings for history buffs, complete with towers, battles, and a mysterious ring. Following directly after Quicksilver and The Confusion, The System of the World plunges headlong into 1714 England. The country is in disarray; "Parliament had its knobby fingers around the Monarch's throat . . . Whigs and Tories were joined in an eternal shin-kicking contest to determine which faction should have the honor of throttling her Majesty, and how hard." Similarly, Stephenson's characters are tangled in a monkey's fist of plotlines. Scientific auteur Isaac Newton obsesses over Solomonic Gold, purported to have properties essential to Alchemy. Eliza, Duchess of Arcachon-Qwghlm, schemes to ensure Princess Caroline attains the Throne of England. Daniel Waterhouse, aging Natural Philosopher, is constantly at risk of premature death by Infernal Devices, as hidden time bombs go off around him with surprising regularity. Finally, there's the picaresque Jack Shaftoe, a man "so surpassingly and transcendently bad that it was necessary for him to be put to death by the most gruesome and, hence, entertaining means that the English mind could conceive of." Now a counterfeiter, Jack plans an attack that could cripple England's monetary structure while still in its infancy. Stephenson's world, while baffling, is never dull, and rarely less than fascinating. As Western society evolves from its established doctrine of Monarchy to the understanding that money makes the world go round, Stephenson marshals his talents, summarizing a period where, like today, logic goes head-to-head with ritual and fear, and the winner is always in doubt. As usual, there is never a theme Stephenson doesn't pursue. The System of the World is chock full of philosophical discourse, scientific reasoning, and mad chases through London's seamy underbelly. Stephenson, a genius at plotting, performs some sort of literary miracle by keeping everything organized. It is testament to his mad skills that a discussion as to who first invented calculus, Newton or von Leibniz, is as exciting as Jack's duel in an opera house, swords clanging and blood spurting as Georg Friedrich Handel frantically attempts to continue his conducting duties. By its touching finale, it is clear that The Baroque Cycle is in a category all its own, a tribute to anyone who fights ignorance, or pursues insane theories with joyful abandon. It has become that rarest of creatures, a three thousand-word tome that you don't want to end. The System of the World, like both its predecessors and Stephenson himself, is complicated, maddening, bizarrely funny, and spectacular.

David O gave it a8:
Keep in mind that The System of the World isn't really the third volume of a trilogy. As Stephenson himself has pointed out a number of times, the Baroque Cycle is really a unified work published in three volumes as a result of the exigencies of publishing and book-making. What we're really looking at, then, is a novel that runs 2600 pages, give or take. Clearly, this sort of thing isn't for everyone, but for those who enjoy nothing more than to immerse themselves in a fully imagined world created by an arguably brilliant writer, there are ample rewards here. Stephenson's gift has always been to blend great storytelling with ample servings of factual and intellectual content, and that tradition continues in the Baroque Cycle.

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