An Asylum for Writers of Speculative Fiction

You know how you have fantasy novels that are set in worlds that are explicitly *not* Earth but have a roughly equivalent climate and biosphere, and human society and technology at some historical level (usually medieval but I've seen later periods).

However once you reach the Industrial Revolution level this stops. From the Victorian Era onwards all Fantasy seems to fall into the Alternative Earth or Hidden Magic varients. Or at least I've never seen it.

And don't get me wrong I love a good contemporary fantasy novel with a hidden magical society and most people blissfully unaware of the magical world, but I'd like to see something different.

And presumably a typical medieval level fantasy world will eventually develop higher tech levels because you know it's inhabited by intelligent people - most of whom can't use magic - who will be looking for ways to make their lives easier.

The worldbuilding project that petered out when I got flu was roughly renaissance level with hints of clock and steampunk and would certainly reach 21st Century technology eventually without losing sight of the fact that dragons, fee, magic and the gods are all real. I will go back to it eventually but at the moment I'm focused on the fact November is less than 2 months away.

Nano is a great time to experiment, and so I'm thinking of using this idea as my setting. Then I realise why no one has ever done it. It wouldn't be easy to create such a world. Then again worthwhile things are rarely easy.

So what do you think? Other world contemporary fantasy - possible or not? And if you actually know of stories where this has been done tell me.

So here's one for you all - hopefully it'll inspire some of you.

Imagine for one minute that Earth (or an earth-like world) had a Steampunk revolution in its Victorian Era (or equivalent).

Imagine it - hold it in your head and roll forward over a hundred years to its early 21st century.

What would that world be like? The aesthetic (after all our modern aesthetic is not very Victorian so there's no reason the post-steampunk world would be), the technology, the science, the culture...

What would the Post-Steampunk era world be like?

Discuss.