Search Worlds Without End

A fantastical alternate history set in a twentieth-century England dominated by the Church of Rome and untouched by the Industrial Revolution chronicles the dramatic impact of a scientific and technological revolution that will transform the world and its peaceful agrarian society.

Table of Contents:

• Prologue - (1968)
• The Lady Margaret - (1966)
• The Signaller - (1966)
• The White Boat - (1966)
• Brother John - (1966)
• Lords and Ladies - (1966)
• Corfe Gate - (1966)
• Coda (Pavane) - (1968)

Jay Lake's first trade novel is an astounding creation. Lake has envisioned a clockwork solar system, where the planets move in a vast system of gears around the lamp of the Sun. It is a universe where the hand of the Creator is visible to anyone who simply looks up into the sky, and sees the track of the heavens, the wheels of the Moon, and the great Equatorial gears of the Earth itself.

Mainspring is the story of a young clockmaker's apprentice, who is visited by the Archangel Gabriel. He is told that he must take the Key Perilous and rewind the Mainspring of the Earth. It is running down, and disaster will ensue if it's not rewound. From innocence and ignorance to power and self-knowledge, the young man will make the long and perilous journey to the South Polar Axis, to fulfill the commandment of his God.

The computer age has arrived a century ahead of time with Charles Babbage's perfection of his Analytical Engine. The Industrial Revolution, supercharged by the development of steam-driven cybernetic Engines, is in full and drastic swing. Great Britain, with her calculating-cannons, steam dreamnoughts, machine-guns and information technology, prepares to better the world's lot...

Bastable encounters an alternate 1941 where the Great War never happened and Great Britain and Germany became allies in a world intimidated by Japanese imperialism. In this world's Russian Empire, Bastable joins the Russian Imperial Airship Navy and is subsequently imprisoned by the rebel Dugashvii, the 'Steel Tsar', also known as Joseph Stalin.