Litro #134 - Augmented Reality

by Dan Coxon (Editor), Bruce Sterling (Contributor), Iain Robinson

"His Cascade stream had been initiated on his fifth birthday. His parents hadn’t wanted him to be left behind, struggling for answers that everyone else had at their fingertips. The procedure was simple and painless. He couldn’t remember life before it. His parents were content to keep their technology on the outside, worn or held. He grew to see them as limited, outmoded." From 'Cascade' by Iain Robinson.

Sometimes the future approaches at frightening speeds. It feels like only yesterday that we were wowed by the birth of the iPhone – now we’re living with gesture recognition for our gaming consoles, voice recognition in our cars, even iris recognition at some airports. Systems like Google Glass and Oculus Rift are breaking down the boundaries between the online world and the physical world – between fantasy and reality. It turns out that the key to the door of perception comes not from mind-altering drugs, but in the shape of a microchip. At times modern life feels like a Philip K. Dick novel.

Litro #134 is our Augmented Reality issue, dedicated to mapping out the new technological landscape and exploring reality’s unpatrolled borders.

Read more online at Litro.co.uk.

Unknown Binding

First published May 1, 2014

About the author

Dan Coxon is an award-winning editor and writer based in London. His non-fiction anthology Writing The Uncanny (co-edited with Richard V. Hirst) won the British Fantasy Award for Best Non-Fiction 2022, while his short story collection Only The Broken Remain (Black Shuck Books) was shortlisted for two British Fantasy Awards in 2021 (Best Collection, Best Newcomer). In 2018 his anthology of British folk-horror, This Dreaming Isle (Unsung Stories), was shortlisted for a British Fantasy Award and a Shirley Jackson Award. His short stories have appeared in various anthologies, including Nox Pareidolia, Beyond the Veil, Mother: Tales of Love and Terror and Fiends in the Furrows III. His latest anthology - Isolation - was published by Titan Books in September 2022.