> I actively dislike Neal Stephenson

Why is that?

I really liked Snow Crash and Anathem. Reamde was okay. I don't remember much about Diamond Age or Cryptonomicon.

I've never felt that in author is wasting my time while reading a book until him. He desperately needs a different, or any, editor. He manages to cram a 400 page story into 700 pages. Just non-stop side tangents and long passage after long passage that goes no where and means nothing to the story. It's fine to have stuff like that to build a world but this he goes overboard. If a character needs to get groceries, he'll turn one sentence about needing to go get groceries into three pages of nothing about how grocery stores work. I find it extremely boring at times, and after you read one of his books and get clued into this, it's hard to read a second book and stay interested.