Snow Crash (Bantam Spectra Book) (original 1992; edition 2000)

This is hands down one of the most unique "sci-fi" books I have ever read. It's not really sci-fi perse it's more cyber-punk set in a dystopic future America, but hey, kinda same thing right?

This wildly exciting novel is damn hard to describe. Hiro Protagonist a pizza delivery guy for the mafia (yep, in the future Pizza delivery is a serious business. the mafia personally guarantees your pizza delivered in 30 minutes or less) who finds himself teaming up with a young kourier (highly skilled skateboarders that deliver packages for hire) to find out about a new virus called "snow crash" before it brings their highly complex technological world crashing down. This description literally only gets you one tenth of the way though the book. You have to read to find out more! And trust me, you'll want to. This book is soo bizarre and soo fun. It's one of a kind. I will definitely be reading more from this genre!! ( )

Stephenson's first major book, as I recall, which established him as an important science fiction writer. It introduces the Metaverse, a 3D virtual space that is the next evolution of the Internet. Possible candidate for rereading, although I am now more interested in Stephenson's later novels.

Read in the 1990s. ( )

While the concept of this book has potential, I feel as if the story never developed beyond the "this is a great idea" stage. The book takes place in a post-apocalyptic America ruled by corporations and follows Hiro Protagonist, a hacker/sword-fighter, as he attempts to unravel the mystery of snow crash, a new drug that can affect you through a computer. Cool right? Unfortunately, the narration does not give readers credit for having any intelligence and comes off as exceedingly condescending. Add the fact that the characters do not develop at all throughout the story, the pacing is static, and the obvious-type humor gets old after the first 50 pages, I finished this book unimpressed.

Note: This book would have gotten 3 stars but it lost one because of the character Y.T. When adult male writers create over-sexualized 15 year old girls, my skin crawls. I support strong, female characters, but this one went way too far. Every time the narrator mentioned her being objectified by pretty much every single man in the book (or making excuses for why so-and-so did not check her out) I increasingly got the feeling that the only real creep was the author. ( )

This is a weird book. I will talk about it later. My brain is still full of weird. ( )

A fun ride, after the first 20 pages. I found this difficult to get into, for some reason, and started it 5 or 6 times. Once I got past all the invented words and jargon, I was hooked. Glad I persevered! ( )