Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson, is a very entertaining read, and unlike a lot of Sci-Fi, it has a lot of Science (be it sociology, linguistics, math, etc) woven into the fiction. It is set in the not-too-distant future, in the remnants of America's west coast.
The central character is a pizza delivery specialist, swordsman, and master coder. Working under the name Hiro Protagonist, he finds himself pitted against evangelists, cable moguls, mutants, the mob (which owns the pizza franchise), and a viral Mesopotamian language/drug, all in the course of a failed delivery.
It's wonderfully ornate, lovingly crafted backdrop is a shattered byproduct of the New World Order come to its inevitable conclusion; small countries neighbor land owned, policed, and governed by franchise outfits. Once his circle of coder friends starts succumbing to the lethal drug Snowcrash, Hiro investigates, following the trail of a freakish drug pusher with a souped up motorbike and a personal nuclear device across boundaries of bizarre scope and complexity.
Featuring supercharged guard dogs, a militant skateboard-couriers' union, a vast private floating raft made from a supertanker and an aircraft carrier purchased from the army, a Gibson-esque cyberworld, and the occasional stop at the library, this is a fascinating and very amusing tale.
