Pretty much my feeling; I actually read this during Eastercon, as we were going to be on a panel together, and it seemed only polite to do so. Intensely frustrating ... the book, I mean. Lots of interesting ideas, some genuinely good and exciting writing, but it shot off all over the place. In the end, I felt like someone had given me a sack in which were shut two or three different novels, which were fighting for supremacy, and I was being obliged to read bits being thrust out of the sack at me, from whichever novel happened to be in the ascendant at that moment. My heart sank somewhat when I discovered this was only part 1.

Editorial discipline may be an old-fashioned concept,but it is to be encouraged, if only to provide a solid framework against which to kick later.