Snow Crash blew my mind when I read it in 1992. It wasn't just Stephenson's fantastic depiction of a global shared virtual reality universe (the Metaverse) that enthralled me, it was his detailed, often-funny world-building -- the United States government shrunken to a useless, paralyzed knot of red tape, Mafia-owned pizza delivery service, America broken up into corporate franchises, paranoid suburban enclaves (burbclaves), skateboard couriers with electromagnetic harpoons to latch onto cars for free rides, hyperinflated trillion-dollar bills being replaced with quadrillion dollar bills (billion dollar bills are cheaper than buying toilet paper)... The novel is a combination of sharp cultural commentary and old fashioned scifi adventure that's as fresh now (I re-read it a few years ago) as it was when it came out over 25 years ago. If you haven't read it, do yourself a favor and pick up the Kindle edition for $2.
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