The Confusion is a novel by Neal Stephenson. It is the second volume in The Baroque Cycle and consists of two sections or books, Bonanza and The Juncto. In 2005, The Confusion won the Locus Award, together with The System of the World, also by Stephenson.
Background
Like the other volumes in the series, Confusion was written as multiple novels. However, unlike in the other two volumes of the Series, the two novels are set in concurrent periods. In the publication of the two novels as a single volume, Stephenson chose to publish the volume as alternating sections between Bonanza and The Juncto, book 4 and 5 respectively.
Plot
Though the first publication of the Series in three volumes combined the two novels Bonanza and The Juncto, here the plots will be dealt with as separate entities, true to the author's original intention.
Themes
As in Quicksilver, Stephenson is concerned with the development of modern economics, science, politics, currency, information technology, trade, religion and cryptography. Even though Stephenson deals with these ideas at extreme length, "His attention to detail and relish for providing historical context provide the attentive reader with a liberal education, while his imagination and humor delight." Andrew Leonard contrasted The Confusion with Quicksilver saying "If one could argue that Quicksilver was about the birth of the scientific method and the application of Reason to unlocking the mysteries of existence, then one could also say The Confusion is about money." He notes that Stephenson is willing to go into excess on certain ideas, developing some plot twists in exhaustive detail.