In the Metaverse - cyberspace home to avatars and software daemons - there is a new drug available- Snow Crash. A cyberdrug that reduces avatars in the digital world to dust, it also infects users in real life, leaving them in a vegetative state.

This is bad news for Hiro, a freelance hacker and the Metaverse's best swordfighter, and mouthy skateboard courier Y. T. Together, investigating the Infocalypse, they trace back the roots of language itself to an ancient Sumerian priesthood and find they must race to stop a shadowy virtual villain hell-bent on world domination.