I found a lot to criticize in Revelation Space. But my overall impression is that the author wouldn't even care. He had an idea (or a bunch) and he was going to write it up, no matter what. There's this unrepentant feeling about it and I think it's great.

To be more specific, in a lot of fiction things are the way they are for a reason. Everything lives to serve the plot. You don't just write things because they are cool. Not unless you are Alastair Reynolds! The plot is very complex, but it's not a "justified" complexity. It's a "check out these cool ideas" complexity.

I thought the characters were pretty crazy and unlikable. With the possible exception of [REDACTED]! [REDACTED] is painted as a dangerous madman, but only in a "tell, don't show" way. Everybody fears him, but he doesn't do anything. I got a kick out of imagining that he's perfectly normal and the rest of the crew is just paranoid.