The second novel from the “hottest science fiction writer in America” (Details), and New York Times bestselling author of the Baroque Cycle and Snow Crash, now available from Grove Press.

Sangamon Taylor is a New Age Sam Spade who sports a wet suit instead of a trench coat and prefers Jolt from the can to Scotch on the rocks. He knows about chemical sludge the way he knows about evil—all too intimately. And the toxic trail he follows leads to some high and foul places. Before long Taylor’s house is bombed, his every move followed, he’s adopted by reservation Indians, moves onto the FBI’s most wanted list, makes up with his girlfriend, and plays a starring role in the near-assassination of a presidential candidate. Closing the case with the aid of his burnout roommate, his tofu-eating comrades, three major networks, and a range of unconventional weaponry, Sangamon Taylor pulls off the most startling caper in Boston Harbor since the Tea Party. As he navigates this ecological thriller with hardboiled wit and the biggest outboard motor he can get his hands on, Taylor reveals himself as one of the last of the white-hatted good guys in a very toxic world.

“[Stephenson] captures the nuance and the rhythm of the new world so perfectly that one almost thinks that it is already here.” —The Washington Post

“Brilliantly realized . . . Stephenson turns out to be an engaging guide to an onrushing tomorrow.” —The New York Times Book Review on Snow Crash

“Establishes Neal Stephenson as a powerful voice for the cyber age . . . At once whimsical, satirical, and cautionary.” —USA Today on The Diamond Age

“Neal Stephenson is the Quentin Tarantino of post-cyberpunk science fiction . . . Having figured out how to entertain the hell out of a mass audience, Stephenson has likewise upped the form’s ante with rambunctious glee.” —The Village Voice on Cryptonomicon