The Diamond AgeThe Diamond Age

-- A Young Ladys Illustrated Primer   Young Nell and her brother Harv are thetes-members of the poor, tribeless class.  Neglected by their mother, Harv looks after Nell.  When he and his gang waylay a certain neo-Victorian-John Percival Hackworth-in the seamy streets of their neighborhood, Harv brings Nell something special: the Primer Following the discovery of his crime, Hackworth begins an odyssey of his own. Expelled from the neo-Victorian paradise, squeezed by agents of Protocol Enforcement on one side and a Mandarin underworld crime lord on the other, he searches for an elusive figure known as the Alchemist.  His quest and Nell's will ultimately lead them to another seeker whose fate is bound up with the Primer-a woman who holds the key to a vast, subversive information network that is destined to decode and reprogram the future of humanity.