Snow Crash

By: Neal Stephenson

Narrated by: Jonathan Davis

Length: 17 hrs and 3 mins

Publisher's summary

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.

©1992 Neal Stephenson (P)2001 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Brilliantly realized...Stephenson turns out to be an engaging guide to an onrushing tomorrow." (The New York Times Book Review)
"Fast-forward free-style mall mythology for the 21st century." (William Gibson)

Very enjoyable

Very interesting story. The reader was well spoken and the character voices were consistent and seemed very appropriate.

A Must Read

You must read this because it is a classic of cyberpunk fiction. It gets only four stars because the story telling could have benefited from some editing and the ending was weak. But Stephenson's vision of the near future is awesome and fun. How can you not read a book where the main character is named "Hiro Protagonist". And this novel spawned the creation of Google Earth! I will definitely read more by this author. I should also comment that the narration of the audio version was excellent and really fit the story.

What a ride!

Any additional comments?

As one of the other reviewers noted, if I had to do it over again, I would have read this book instead of listening to it - not that there is anything wrong with the narration, which is excellent. It is, however, a very involved plot with lots of descriptions and lots of characters. I found that I had to stop whatever I was doing at the same time and really pay attention to it or I would start losing the thread.

It took some dedication to get through a slightly slow start but I'm glad I stuck with it. Stephenson manages to weave together wildly disparate themes. The book swings back and forth between very detailed explanations (with which I occasionally became impatient) and rocketing action. I normally would never recommend this but I think I might have gotten a bit more out of the book if I had read the WIkipedia precis first, so I had some lay of the futureland that Stephenson has created.

Decent story, but Neal is creepy

The author decided that writing a lengthy and explicit love scene between a 15 year old girl and a grown man was a good idea. Completely ruined the book for me.

Cyberpunk at its best

Steaming cyberpunk action from beginning to end.

Stepenson sketches a frenchised distopia that is read as a fast passed movie script. The narator is instrumental in bringing characters to life and the tone of the work is captured spot on. Overall a fun and exciting listening experience.

Captivating and mind widening speculative sci-fi!

Starts nice and slow, almost gives a feeling of just another book about virtual reality, but then suddenly takes off to unpredictable, wowing and hypnotizing story, which you can't wait to dive in again.

Fascinating and intriguing ideas merge information technology, linguistics, neuroscience, and religion into a single grand unification theory of human intelligence. Neal and his Snow Crash made me think about many aspects of humanity and Inspired my interest in human history way better than anything I had in my education.

Narrator Jonathan Davis is just amazing, switching from the protagonist katana fighter hacker to Asian rapper and fifteen year old outrageous girl.

Thanks to both Jonathan and Neal for fantastic in both senses 17.05 hours.

Hope to see Neal soon in the Magic Leap Metaverse.

Great story, thrill ride the whole way

Where does Snow Crash rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

I would put Snow Crash near the top of the audio books I've listened to so far.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Snow Crash?

Of the many characters, I come back to Hiro, our protaganist. He is a scimitar weilding pizza delivery man. His chapters are my favorite.

What does Jonathan Davis bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Like most audiobooks I took awhile to get used to his delivery and cadence. Once i was "in" it was a smooth ride. I was perturbed at first with the chapter sound effects, but they grew on me.

Any additional comments?

This is worth the listen.

An imaginative story with some inconsistencies.

I liked the meta verse parts of the story. When the author ventured back into the so called real world, things would get too inconsistent in the story.

The Deliverator is awesome!

What made the experience of listening to Snow Crash the most enjoyable?

A lot of the future concepts are amazing!

Would you be willing to try another book from Neal Stephenson? Why or why not?

Yes, I would, but I didn't really enjoy the "religious" aspects of this book.

What about Jonathan Davis’s performance did you like?

The voice performance was amazing! There were distinct voices for each character.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

I don't think I could have because it was too long, but I probably would have.

A good performance, and a unique story, but..

... but just because the story is unique, doesn't make it good, in my opinion. The story is based on a unique concept that language is a virus, and certain aspects were interesting, but the book on a whole didn't impress me. I was happy when I was done so I could move onto something different. I loved the first 30 minutes, of the story, and had high hopes, but after that it kind of went down hill. Also, between every chapter is a 3-5 second sound effect/Indian chant thing, that after the 3rd time becomes pretty annoying, and tiresome.