The fascinating story of four maverick siblings is interwoven with a magisterial and multi-faceted account of the industrial, political, and artistic ferment of early 19th-century Britain The richly varied lives of the Martin brothers reflected the many upheavals of Britain in the age of Industrial Revolution. Low-born and largely unschooled, they were part of a new generation of artists, scientists, and inventors who witnessed the creation of the modern world. William, the eldest, was an eccentric inventor; Richard fought in the Peninsular War and at Waterloo; Jonathan, a hellfire preacher tormented by madness; while John the youngest single-handedly invented, mastered, and exhausted an entire genre of painting, the apocalyptic sublime, while playing host to the foremost writers, scientists, and thinkers of his day.

This narrative centers on a generation of inventors, artists, and radical intellectuals (including the chemist Humphry Davy, the engineer George Stephenson, the social reformer Robert Owen, and t