Snow Crash
by Neal Stephenson
I quite enjoyed this-- it's not my favorite, or even my favorite [a:Neal Stephenson|545|Neal Stephenson|http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1192826259p2/545.jpg], but it certainly captures a lot of the things I enjoy about his writing style. Stephenson does really good near-future sci-fi because he excels at taking something from our own time and going crazy with it, but at the same time keeping it detailed and sprawling and very realistic. In the case of [b:Snow Crash|830|Snow Crash|Neal Stephenson|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1157396730s/830.jpg|493634], all you have to do is accept one possibly science-fictional idea in order for the rest of the story and world to fall into place with a resounding crash.
Near the end where they're author-dumping philosophy of religion... I can even agree with the line of thinking to an extent, but the part where Judaism is summoned up and just as quickly dismissed as 'a good attempt for the time, but outdated and replaced by Christianity' felt like a punch in the stomach. That's a pretty good simplification of the way it looks from the outside, but it's something Jews hear all the time, as if Judaism is made irrelevant and pointless by its eventually more popular offshoot.
Almost as a side note, I was entertained to notice the similarities of Hiro's "Earth" program to Google Earth. I wonder whether Google got their inspiration from the book, or if it's just an obvious idea. (Probably more the latter.)