How to capture an eclipse of the sun

Fortunately, they all revolve around a truly interesting character, a brilliant mathematician and photographer named Miss Selena Cott. Experimenting in France with the newly invented camera of Louis Daguerre, this young woman has invented a secret way to speed up the exposure time (from many minutes to 20 seconds) and take pictures of shadows. And, of course, she's gorgeous.

Several members of the team object repeatedly to her presence, and friends terrify her with warnings of what horrors she'll face in the desert, but she bolsters her courage with "the crisp, cool new word much in use, 'scientist.' " Much of the humor along the way stems from Selena's clever retorts to the tedious chauvinism she endures from these men, whose professional identities are so threatened by her sex. There's a strong feminist theme running through this story that points to social reprogramming more complex than anything calculated by a future "difference engine."

Of course, troubles dog the entire 2,000-mile trip. Some team members are not prepared for anything more strenuous than a voyage to the parlor. The logistics of such a voyage were staggeringly complex, and the odds of success depressingly low. In addition to providing food and water, they must keep their horses alive, navigate with vague maps, repair the wagons, avoid threatening Indians, and somehow maintain state-of-the-art equipment that must work flawlessly for the first time when the heavens align.

Byrd maintains interest not only with a steady stream of fascinating historic detail and some comic sexual tension between these intrepid eclipse hunters, but also by hopping back periodically to Charles Babbage's salon, where the eccentric inventor is continuing to proclaim his machine's wonders. "If you reason by analogy," Babbage tells a crowd of enraptured ladies, "miracles in nature - the parting of the Red Sea, for example, Joshua's halting of the sun in the middle of the sky - are not necessarily violations of natural law, but the carrying out of a higher law, God's law, as yet unknown to us."

Back in the scorching Southwestern desert, five lost adventurers start to hope for a miracle of their own. Bickering and running out of water, they finally realize (or reveal) that the real purpose of their trip is not at all as advertised. As others' dark intentions begin to eclipse Selena's hopes for success, she sees only one risky way out.

Academics might wag a hoary finger at this history as pop corn, but Byrd has great fun with it, and so do we. Besides, all along this fictional adventure, he's left a trail of irresistible tidbits about the development of the territory, the technology, and the culture of the 19th century. And he makes perfectly clear that science has never been any more dispassionate or objective than the people carrying it out.

• Ron Charles is the Monitor's book editor. Send e-mail comments toRon Charles.

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