Vaguely pseudo-victorian whateverpunk usually has themes of social change at their center given that the 19th century was full of revolutions and new political ideas and science and people finally figuring out that making sick people bleed on purpose is a bad idea

I'm sure anyone could look at either one of our stories and go "whoa just like Treasure Planet/Perdido Street Station/other vaguely similar thing"

correct me if I'm mistaken, but I think it's a condition called "having read China Mieville syndrome" and I also suffer from it, I'm afraid