Rating: 
Summary: Speedy Ride - Where's it going?
Review: Call me old fashioned. While the pace of this book is fast and it does contain some great imagery, shouldn't it go somewhere? Hiro Protagonist has devoted so much of his resources to the 'metaverse' that is an internet with expanded VR capabilites. So much so that his daily life is drabola. i.e.- He lives in a mini storage warehouse. In praise of the book, these guys are rubber balls- the worse things can happen to them and they bounce right back. Go ahead, buy the book; but beware; it is a massive download of gargantuam proportions. Drink five cups of coffee, skim it, be amused by zaniness and get info overload!
Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic. Stephenson is the man.
Review: Stephenson continues to amaze me with the amount of research he puts into books. You can learn a lot of fascinating material from each of them.
Snow Crash was written over ten years ago, but amazingly Stephenson's foresight in regards to online interaction and computer technology advancement are impressive.
One of the major ideas Stephenson uses in this novel really intrigues me. He takes relationships in computer structure and applies it to linguistics - in the early days of computer programming, it was very low level interaction, programming instructions weren't very human friendly. Over time, we have created higher and higher level languages that allow us to program computers with language more english like and easily understandable. His idea is that human language has progressed the same way, that there is some basic primal understanding that we all share, and that our current languages worldwide, are high level abstractions that allow us to manipulate conversations and information processing with greater ease. Furthermore, he puts forth that the lower level human language is still accessible, much like you could still program in assembly if you wish.
He gets into much more detail and extends this idea far more, but I won't share that as it's extensive and a spoiler.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best books I have ever read
Review: First of all the main character's name is Hiro Protagonist, that is just awesome! Stephenson's cyberpunk world is not only hilarious, it is actually believable, sort of. When I finished this book I immediately began searching for a sequel. The lack of a sequel is the only downside in my opinion.
Rating:
Summary: lotsa flash, but is there substance?
Review: The book is quite a rollercoaster ride. It's mostly a showcase for images and ideas, tons of them, thrown at you a mile a minute. The breaks in the narrative, and even the Sumerian mythology dissertations, didn't distract me. I even liked those parts, and felt they gave more substance to the book than it would have otherwise had. Granted the "language is a virus" riff was copped straight from William S. Burroughs, but Stephenson played it well.The characterization and plotting reminded me very much of an anime, something that other reviewers have pointed out accurately. Unfortunately, I don't care for anime very much. Most anime is thinly plotted and poorly characterized, and Stephenson's book suffers from the same problem. To be honest with you, the character I sympathized the most with was the cyber-dog. Stephenson created an interesting world that I liked spending time in, but he didn't seem to know quite what to do with it, and overall "Snow Crash" is overwhelmed by its author's florid imagination. Sadly, Stephenson followed this tendency in his subsequent writing instead of focusing on learning how to write plots and characters. His work since "Snow Crash" is imaginative, but didactic to the point of being incomprehensible, and plots and characters are low on his priority list. "Snow Crash" is by far Stephenson's best work, and because of this it remains the only one that most science fiction readers know him for. Hopefully one day Stephenson can get his imagination under a bit more control, learn more about plot and characterization, and produce more humanistic and less manic work. Until then, this is his best, and it's worth reading.
Rating: 
Summary: Deliverator
Review: Snow Crash was Neal Stephenson's breakthrough novel and is the one that saw him being labelled inaccurately as a cyberpunk novelist. Snow Crash is a brilliant witty science fiction adventure. In the near future the nation state of America has broken down and people live in corporate owned mini city-states. The Mafia control pizza delivery and Hiro Protagonist a samurai sword wielding deadbeat hacker is a Deliverator of pizzas. Hiro is drawn into a complex plot to enslave people's minds when a computer virus/drug called Snow Crash is released onto the Metaverse. Trying to stop Hiro in his quest to save the world is Raven an Aleutian psychopath with razor thin glass knives and a Nuclear Weapon strapped to his motorcycle. This book is responsible for bringing into public consciousness many cyberspace concepts that are now becoming commonplace. The concept of the Metaverse and Avatars is now mainstream in MMORPGs such as Everquest and The Sims Online. Also the idea that the human brain is programmable and is capable of crashing has become accepted by neuroscientists and can be seen in the science of Neuro-Linguistic Programming. Stephenson demonstrates an ability here to dump a lot of information into your brain without you noticing, and although there are a few missteps along the way generally his science is sound unlike many SF writers. The one failing of the book is that the over-arching threat posed by L. Bob Rife and his plan to take over the world never seems threatening enough and dwindles in comparison to the actual physical threat of Raven. The world conceived of in the book is both a brilliant backdrop to the plot and a credible possible future that we may be facing. When governments lose the power to collect taxes then they cease to be of any use and citizens will seek the services of protection and education from corporations. If the first 25 pages don't get you hooked then put the book down, step away carefully and go numb your mind by watching television game shows.
Rating:
Summary: Entertaining, but...
Review: ...nothing in this book is particularly new. Neal Stephenson's vision of a comically fractured near future has been treated by a number of more talented authors, notably William Gibson. His weird "plot twist" about language being a driving force behind human development, is, well, courtesy of William S. Burroughs and his "Word Virus" concept (at least in the context). Don't get me wrong, I love to see authors borrow each others ideas in this kind of fashion, but when I read this I got the feeling that Neal Stephenson's prominence in the science fiction genre was due to one of those minor upheavals in preference and styles that come and go about once every five years or so...he doesn't do anything original, but he does it capably well, and at the time that happens to be enough. His later efforts have not notably proved me wrong. Even I can't deny the man's talent as a storyteller, though. Even though every fifty pages or so I had to burst out "oh, come on!" I kept turning pages...and isn't that what it's all about? One day Stephenson may find a way to keep us turning pages without those outbursts...I hope he finds it soon.
Rating:
Summary: Ulitimate cyberpunk
Review: The ultimate cyberpunk Sci-Fi. This epic novel sets the standard by which all future cyberpunk will be compared. Neal Stephenson's mind and the method of expression is beyond compare in this arena. This stories interwoven plots and characters are of grandmaster quality. It take a very possible future sprinkles it with probable techy toys and winds it around a 'Hero' in which all can relate. A must read for hacker and stringer but only read it once the mistake blare after the frist time.
Rating:
Summary: Very entertaining and thought provoking.
Review: My 16 year old grandson recommended this book and loaned me his copy. I really enjoyed it. The social commentary is great. It portrays a United States that has been sold to large coporations, where the government has become nothing more than a slave to these companies and an unscrupulous TV preacher is trying to conquer the world. There are no longer any freedoms and "might makes right". In this United States the Mafia are the good guys. All of this is told with a great mix of computer science fiction and a very interesting discussion of linguistics.
Rating:
Summary: What a ride!
Review: One of my favorite books and one of my favorite authors. Stephenson writes in the same vein as Thomas Pynchon, but it's a faster ride and the storyline is easier to follow. And, unlike Gravity's Rainbow, things get more or less resolved at the end. Stephenson weaves together notions of cyberspace, virtual reality, and avatars, much as presented in The Matrix, but ties it in with plot twists of ancient Sumeria, religion, drugs, viruses of all sorts, and ties it all together with different ways of hacking the firmware of the wetware. Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Waste of paper - don't bother with this one.
Review: Childish, sophomoric, vulgar, juvenile. Get the picture? A complete waste of paper. My guess is that this book probably appeals to immature teenage boys with raging hormones (nothing wrong with that, per se, it's just that the book feels as if it was written by someone stuck in puberty) and those with limited imaginations - it certainly is not what one might call "literature." At best, it may be possible to that state the author has an "imagination," however, that doesn't make this book a creative experience. The story weaves and spins through endless threads that come from nowhere and then disappear, completely, into the ether. Got too much time on your hands and want something to scramble you brain on? Then this book is for you. Otherwise, look elsewhere for substance - this book doesn't have any.
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