5.0

This would be one of those idea-heavy sci-fi books with a sprawling "epic" plot and uninteresting characters if it had not been written by Stephenson, who combines a techno-fetishist appeal with memorable characters to good effect. This is an intelligent and believable story of the unintended (and arguably positive) results of a proscribed technology released in to the wild, and it is one of my favorite SF books.