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Original Essays | September 17, 2013
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More copies of this ISBNThis title in other editionsOther titles in the Bantam Spectra Book series:Snow Crashby Neal Stephenson
Staff Pick
Snow Crash is one of my favorites. It's an epic cyber-punk tale that contains elements that are both fantastical and very realistic. The characters are richly imagined, even the villains. It is fast paced and well embellished, containing elements of Sumerian mythology and cryptology combined with very probable future tech and easily plausible events. As with all of Neal Stephenson's books, Snow Crash is dense, entertaining, and thought provoking. Synopses & ReviewsPublisher Comments:One of Time magazine's 100 all-time best English-language novels.
Only once in a great while does a writer come along who defies comparison — a writer so original he redefines the way we look at the world. Neal Stephenson is such a writer and Snow Crash is such a novel, weaving virtual reality, Sumerian myth, and just about everything in between with a cool, hip cybersensibility to bring us the gigathriller of the information age. In reality, Hiro Protagonist delivers pizza for Uncle Enzo's CosaNostra Pizza Inc., but in the Metaverse he's a warrior prince. Plunging headlong into the enigma of a new computer virus that's striking down hackers everywhere, he races along the neon-lit streets on a search-and-destroy mission for the shadowy virtual villain threatening to bring about Infocalypse. Snow Crash is a mind-altering romp through a future America so bizarre, so outrageous... you'll recognize it immediately. Review:"Stephenson has not stepped, he has vaulted onto the literary stage with this novel." Los Angeles Reader
Review:"A cross between Neuromancer and Thomas Pynchon's Vineland. This is no mere hyperbole." San Francisco Bay Guardian
Review:"Fast-forward free-style mall mythology for the 21st century." William Gibson, author of Neuromancer
Review:"Brilliantly realized....Stephenson turns out to be an engaging guide to an onrushing tomorrow." The New York Times Book Review
Review:"Snow Crash takes on a whole slew of nasty contemporary trends and extrapolates them hilariously into a pessimistic and unlikely newar future....this is one book to chill out with this summer." Mondo 2000
Review:"Stylish noir extrapolation becomes gloriously witty social satire...savor Stephenson's delicious prose and cheerfully impudent wit. Cyberpunk isn't dead — it has just (belatedly) developed a sense of humor." Locus
Review:"A fantastic, slam-bang-overdrive, supersurrealistic, comic-spooky whirl through a tomorrow that is already happening. Neal Stephenson is intelligent, perceptive, hip and will become a major force in American writing." Timothy Leary
Synopsis:First arriving on the scene in 1992 to critical acclaim, this definitive novel of the information age weaves virtual reality, Sumerian myth, and just about everything in between. Stephenson is author of the bestselling Cryptonomicon and The Diamond Age.
About the AuthorNeal Stephenson issues from a clan of rootless, itinerant hardscience and engineering professors (mostly Pac-10, Big 10, and Big 8 with the occasional wild strain of Ivy). He began his higher education as a physics major, then switched to geography when it appeared that this would enable him to scam more free time on his universitys mainframe computer. When he graduated and discovered, to his perplexity, that there were no jobs for inexperienced physicist-geographers, he began to look into alternative pursuits such as working on cars, unimaginably stupid agricultural labor, and writing novels. His first novel, The Big U, was published in 1984 and vanished without a trace. His second novel, Zodiac: An Eco-Thriller, came out in 1988 and quickly developed a cult following among water-pollution-control engineers. It was also enjoyed, though rarely bought, by many radical environmentalists. Snow Crash was written in the years 1988 through 1991 as the author listened to a great deal of loud, relentless, depressing music.
Mr. Stephenson now resides in a comfortable home in the western hemisphere and spends all of his time trying to retrofit an office into its generally dark, unlevel, and asbestos-laden basement so that he can attempt to write more novels. Despite the tremendous amounts of time he devotes to writing, playing with computers, listening to speed metal, Rollerblading, and pounding nails, he is a flawless husband, parent, neighbor, and all-around human being. What Our Readers Are SayingAdd a comment for a chance to win!Average customer rating based on 10 comments: 
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