The Emperor of All Things

Thrilling work of historical fantasy set in a reimagined 18th century England in the throes of a bloody war with France about a secret society of clockmakers and a supernatural time-piece worth killing for...

Tempus Rerum Imperator: Time, Emperor of All Things

The year is 1758. England is at war, embroiled in a globe-spanning conflict that stretches from her North American colonies to Europe and beyond. And now, after more than two years of military and diplomatic setbacks, the country itself is at risk. Across the Channel, the French prepare for an invasion — an invasion rumored to be led by none other than Bonnie Prince Charlie. It seems the map of Europe is about to be redrawn . . . again. Yet beneath the surface, behind the scenes, another war is raging - a war that will determine not just the fate of nations but of humanity itself.

Daniel Quare is a journeyman in the Worshipful Company of Clockmakers, an ancient guild whose royal charter confers absolute authority over the manufacture of timepieces. But Quare is more than he seems. He is a Regulator, a member of an elite spy network within the guild — a network devoted to searching out and claiming for England's exclusive use any horological innovation that could conceivably result in an advantage for Britain over her adversaries, whether in business or in war.

It is just such a mission that brings him one moonlit night to the London townhouse of the eccentric collector Lord Wichcote. But there he finds more than he bargained for. A pocket watch possessed of seemingly impossible properties — deadly properties that seem to have more to do with magic than with any science familiar to Quare or to his superiors in the guild, Sir Thaddeus Wolfe, Grandmaster of the Order, and Theophilus Magnus, head of the Most Secret and Exalted Order of Regulators.

But the strange watch has drawn the attention of others as well. The mysterious masked thief known only as Grimalkin, and a French spy — and cold-blooded killer — who seeks to bring the prize back to his masters. Soon Quare finds himself following a trail of intrigue and murder that leads far from the world he knows into an otherwhere of dragons and demigods, in which nothing is as it seems . . . time least of all.

About the Author

Born in Zurich, Paul Witcover is a writer and critic and, with Elizabeth Hand, created the cult comic book series Anima. He has served as the curator of the New York Review of Science Fiction reading series and his work has also appeared on HBO. He lives in New York City and is currently working on the sequel to The Emperor of All Things.