Dore Konstantin is officer in charge of TechnoCrime, Artificial Reality Division and, as if handling a heavy case-load almost single-handed wasn't enough, she's now got a stalker to deal with.Extremely wealthy Hasting Dervish is the stalker according to Susannah Ell -- and she should know. Firstly, she's the one being stalked; secondly, she used to be married to Dervish. Worse, Susannah claims he's swapped places with an ambitious AI, and now Dervish has all the processing power he needs to infiltrate every line of code in Susannah's AR design studio.
Meanwhile the AI is using Dervish's body as a base to visit AR, and hanging out in the gambling casinos of the Lowdown Hong Kong mound. This is where Goku of a Japanese law-enforcement agency, comes in. Since he likes going into AR in the persona of a nine-year-old kid, this really makes Konstantin unhappy. But if she's going to get the goods on Hastings Dervish, she'll have to deal with Goku.

Pat Cadigan is two-time winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award for best science fiction novel of the year. She has also won a prestigious Hugo Award. She lives and writes in London.