wow, ya'll got some good taste in books.

Adding to my list thanks to ya'll: Chaos and harmony, Apocolyse How, and Filth.

Rebgirl, have you read Pillars of the Earth? Being into history, you might like it. It's fiction (takes place around 1100), but Follet (who'd always written spy novels) was interested in cathedrals from a young age and always wanted to find out more about the people who built them. It's a fascinating epic; I highly recommend it to all. And the sequal is about a bridge builder a couple hundred years later.