Fall; or, Dodge in Hell [Stephenson, Neal]

"While [Richard 'Dodge' Forthrast] undergoes a routine medical procedure, something goes irrevocably wrong. Dodge is pronounced brain dead and put on life support ... Long ago, when a much younger Dodge drew up his will, he directed that his body be given to a cryonics company ... Legally bound to follow the directive despite their misgivings, Dodge's family has his brain scanned and its data structures uploaded and stored in the cloud ... In the coming years, technology allows Dodge's brain to be turned back on ... An eternal afterlife--the Bitworld--is created, in which humans continue to exist as digital souls. But this brave new immortal world is not the utopia it might first seem"