Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle
The first one's called Quicksilver. Three books, about a million words all together
( Grrrmachine the indifference engine, Sun 14 Aug 2011, 11:10, archived)

I don't know where he gets the energy to write those,
reading them is bad enough.
( well, Sun 14 Aug 2011, 11:16, archived)