In Country of Blind
by Michael Flynn

Description:
Set primarily in the present, with flashbacks to the 1800's, In the Country of the Blind concerns a small group of American idealists who actually managed to build the Analytical Engine designed by Charles Babbage and then used it to develop cliology: mathematical models that could chart the likely course of the future. When their calculations predicted a united Germany armed with unimaginable powerful bombs in 1939, the Charles Babbage Society kept it from ever happening. Soon they were working to alter history's course to suit their own liking in other ways. By our own time, the society has become the secret master of the world. But no secret can be kept forever, at least not without dramatic measures. When her plans for some historical real estate lead developer and ex-reporter Sarah Beaumont to stumble across the Society's existance, it is just the first step into a baffling maze of conspiracies.

Originally released in paperback in 1980, this is the first hardcover edition and includes Flynn's article from Analog "An Introduction to Cleology," about the ideas underlying the book. This is a revised edition of this book.

Clarkesworld Comments: I read this back when it first came out in 1980. I consider this to be one of the most interesting tales I've read.