I have a problem with Neal Stephenson. I love his ideas, I love the flow of his stories and I hate his dialogue. Like all of Stephenson's fiction, this is a novel stuffed with ideas spanning years of history as well as the future in which it is set. I just wish his characters didn't have to talk to each other like they are walking encyclopedias.

Released at Berks/Hants meet last night

Caught at the Reading meet-up. I have to admit I've not read any of Neal Stephenson's work before, but the blurb sounded intriguing. I'll let you know how I get on with it.

Hmmm, William Gibson it aint, nor Jeff Noon, but still enjoyable for all that. The scope of the novel is very wide, and maybe that's it's undoing for me. I could empathise with Hiro, but liked the Y.T and Raven characters more. One thing that did resonate with me was the ease by which youngsters can be co-opted into a cultish lifestyle with simple kindness, where they've never experienced it before.

From my Unconvention goody-bag. I've read "Snow Crash" before, but I may need to re-read it this month for an SF book club.

NB: Tiggsybabes and Caro1 would both like to read this after me

The sky and ground are black, like a computer screen that hasn't had anything drawn into it yet; it is always nighttime in the Metaverse and the street is always garish and brilliant, like Las Vegas freed from constraints of physics and finance.

This book is set in a near-future America which is divided into a patchwork of burbclaves and city states such as Mr Lee's Greater Hong Kong and Nova Sicilia, run on a franchise basis by big business and organisations such as the Mafia. Aptly named pizza delivery man and freelance hacker Hiro Protagonist and teenage skateboarding Kourier Y.T. become involved in investigating a drug called Snow Crash that has recently appeared both in the real world and on the Street in the virtual reality Metaverse (where drugs had been thought to be impossible). They tangle with communications mogul L. Bob Rife, the Asian refugees of the Raft, the Mafia and an Evangelical church whose members speak in tongues in their efforts to work out what exactly is going on and find an antidote to Snow Crash. The only downside that I found to this very exciting story is that I thought that the ending just tailed off and then the book was over.

Going to Caro1 next, and then Tiggsybabes. Enjoy : )

Arrived safely yesterday. Looking forward to reading this. A friend of mine raves about Neal Stephenson and I thought it was time I found out why.