The Difference Engine (1991)

  An imagined 1855: the Industrial Revolution is in full and inexorable swing, powered by steam-driven, cybernetic engines. Charles Babbage perfects his Analytical Engine, and the computer age arrives a century ahead of its time. ¶

'The Difference Engine', co-authored with Bruce Sterling, is not set in the future but in the middle of an alternate nineteenth century. Steam-driven mechanical computers have been developed and determine the life of the protagonists in this detective story. ¶

Gibson and Sterling point out the effects of the information age one hundred years ahead of its time. This book is often refered to as a 'Steampunk' novel because of the steam driven analog computers in this story. ¶