London & Clockwork

I've read a couple of books recently and we just watched the movie Hugo (music starts playing automatically), and they all involve London or clockwork or both. Hugo is set in Paris, but it has more than it's share of clockwork (that's Hugo in the picture). The books:

• The System of the World by Neal Stephenson
• Perdido Street Station by China Mieville
• The Difference Engine by William Gibson & Bruce Sterling

I haven't finished Perdido Street Station, and technically it isn't set in London, but having just read The Difference Engine, the description of the city of New Crobuzon sounds very much like London in the 1800's, which doesn't sound much different than London in the 1700's in The System of the World, except for the addition of steam engines and calculating machines, which are under development in The System of the World. All three of these books paint a picture of a city that is just really gross and disgusting. Really makes you appreciate things like modern plumbing, sewage lines and the EPA. 

As usual, there are almost no pictures of the fabulous clockwork from the movie Hugo out on the web. Lots of boring pictures of the actors but virtually nothing of interest. I did find one on The Economic Voice. Hugo is a pleasant little story, but it also has fair bit about one of the pioneers of film making: Georges Méliès.