Snow Crash

Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson is a science fiction novel about viruses. It's both deep and funny, the ironic humor starting with a main character named Hiro Protagonist.

A discussion of the title: Hiro: " 'This Snow Crash thing—is it a virus, a drug, or a religion?' Juanita shrugs. 'What's the difference?' " (p. 200)

Themes include computer viruses, biological viruses and viral ideas, all interconnected from ancient Sumerian mythology to a futuristic virtual reality called the Metaverse. Language is a key theme, beginning with the Biblical story of Babel (Genesis 11:1-9) and continuing to the modern concepts of DNA (the language of biology) and the binary language of digital computers.

The book is also full of thrilling action and unforgettable characters, such as Y.T. (Yours Truly), a 15-year old girl with a high-tech skateboard and Attitude.

Neal Stephenson is both an entertaining author and a deep thinker. Over on my work blog, I have mentioned another book by Neal Stephenson that is about a near future world where nanotechnology is ubiquitous: The Diamond Age. His magnum opus is Cryptonomicon, which I have also read, but not yet blogged about. All highly recommended.

Snow Crash was published in 1992, before the Internet and World Wide Web became widely popular. (The first popular web browser, Mosaic, was released in 1993.) Note that Neal Stephenson is apparently a friend of Jaron Lanier, whom I wrote about last month: You Are Not a Gadget (see the Update).