Rating: 
Summary: Stunning first novel!
Review: I just finished reading this (I read the last 200 pages in one sitting) and I loved it! I noticed several people have complained about the ending... well, pooh on them. I enjoyed it, thought the plot was amazing, good character development and a wonderful mystery to unravel.I simply cannot wait for Mr. Reynolds' next work!
Rating: 
Summary: Stop reading before the last 12 pages!
Review: Great book, a great plot, exciting characters, kept me guessing till the end, book would have got 5 stars if it had stopped twelve pages earlier then it did, (except last 2 pages) the part about the neutron star was totally unbelievable and dumb....an apparant misguided effort to give the book a "happy" ending...maybe the editors required it!!
Rating:
Summary: Well it is certainly "hard" SF...
Review: I knew what I was in for when I started reading Revelation Space. Obviously science would form an important part of this book, but I felt it played too big a part. If we want science fiction to be seriously considered literature, it has to BE literature. Science fiction needs to be about people, not cold machines and fantastic technology. Reynolds spends too much time describing the minutiae of his far flung technological creations, and is far less evocative when dealing with his characters. I felt there was a solid base for each of the characters, and they did seem interesting, especially Volvoya and Sylveste, but they needed more of the author's attention. One element that I did enjoy was the dialogue, and that helped ameliorate Reynolds' misplaced focus. The story, however, was truly incredible, like nothing I've read before. "Epic" describes Revelation Space more than any other book I've read (though The Worthing Saga is a close second). The scale and pure quantity of content was amazing, though it forced Reynolds to glaze over some of the nuances of the story, i.e. the Conjoiners, pattern Jugglers, and how exactly humanity made it off Earth. But these are just minor greivances. Revelation Space was a great book, with a few superficial flaws, though perhaps too "hard" for my tastes.
Rating:
Summary: Great setup, lousy ending
Review: This is a rich, rich world, full of mysteries. Comparable to Niven's Known Space, but 21st century in outlook. Reynolds does a great job of setting things up on a collision course. The collision itself is somewhat disappointing, especially at the end, but he effectively sets up new challenges for the series. I will definitely look for the next book.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Space Opera
Review: I came to Alastair Reynolds after reading several CJ Cherryh books (Cyteen, Devil To The Belt). I was interested in more SF, but was kind of tired of the soap-opera and political wrangling of Cherryh's books. Don't get me wrong, I love her books, but sometimes I just want to read a book about spacey traditional SF stuff. Alastair Reynolds' first book, Revelation Space, offers a rich story weaving several complex independant plotlines into one whole story spanning many hundreds of years, with the very fate of humanity at its epicentre. Its mature, grown-up fiction. People are ugly and dishonest. Ships arent gleaming chrome arrows flying through space at faster-than-light speeds, and there arent hundreds of benevolent alien races out there working hand in hand. Reynolds paints a dark but plausible future for humanity. What I most appreciated about the book was the seeming determination of the author to "keep his feet on the ground." Only once or twice does Reynolds spin off into the SF mumbo-jumbo that often pollutes other operatic SF novels. Reynolds is an astronomer, and that, perhaps, is the root of his reserved prose. Overall a wholly enjoyable book. When you finish, you might want to pick up the other books he has written. Amazon.com does not sell them in the US, but amazon.co.uk does sell the three other books -- two of which are sequels, and the other takes place in the same universe. Highly recommended.
Rating: 
Summary: Struggling to finish
Review: This is another sci-fi book that I bought because the Amazon reviews were excellent. Unfortunately, I am 200 pages into it after 2-3 months of working on it. It just doesn't beg me to pick it up the way some books do. It's sitting on the edge of my desk right now piled under 2-weeks of bills and junkmail. It's only on my desk because my wife brought it in from the kitchen when she was picking up. I feel obligated to finish it and figure out what's going on, but it's almost like chinese water torture. There's so much stuff in it that doesn't contribute to the story and, after 200 pages, I don't feel like it's progressing towards a conclusion. The biggest problem I have with books like these is the excessive technobabble and jumping back and forth between timelines, ships, locations, and even characters. So at this point, I don't even know who the main character is, or if there is a main character.
Rating: 
Summary: OK
Review: If this was Reynold's third or fourth novel, I would have been dissapointed. However, for a debut, this was decent.
I don't know why people are calling this "amazing", because it certainly was not. Given how little the plot actually moved along, this book could have been 100 pages shorter. I will give Reynolds credit though, for a first book, he had some interesting concepts and kept the reader intrigued enough (just enough) to keep reading.
Not bad. I'm interested to see if there is an improvement in Chasm City.
Rating:
Summary: Alastair's Shiny New Space Opera
Review: Great read. Alastair Reynolds submits his first space opera for your perusal. Reynolds fulfills the needs of space opera junkies by building a universe with lighthugging starships, cyberviruses, and characters that are, well, dealing with it all. This novel is all about addressing the Fermi Paradox. If you don't know what that is then you probably won't like the book -- then again, just do a Google search, because you will like the book. The characters feel real, the technology is plausible and I can feel the influences of Vernor Vinge, Frank Herbert, Peter Hamilton, and even Neal Stephenson. Wow - that's a tall crowd. I have only one nit about this novel - Reynolds jumps between innumerable subplots at the beginning - sometimes in with what seems like microsecond duration. Very hard to follow, but in the end he ties it all up with a bow. All in all, this book is a must for anyone wanting to see what a space opera written in 2002 looks like. The sequel, Chasm City reads like a great encore too. Thanks Alastair -- you surpassed my expectations!
Rating:
Summary: Great Science Fiction
Review: I've been reading and enjoying science fiction for at least 40 years. For many years I've been very dissatisfied with the quality of new works, even those that win the major awards. This novel turned out to be one of the most satisfying works of science fiction I have read in many years. I couldn't wait to get home at night and pick it up again. The combination of plot and amazing technology kept me enthralled. I think this book will rank as a classic. I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys good, hard, science fiction.
Rating:
Summary: excellent pure sci-fi
Review: Just finished it last night. This is def. the best sci-fi book I have read this year. OUTSTANDING. Reynolds has created his view of the future and it is weird, dark, unique, and one that I want to explore. His glimpses into the past left me wanting to know more about dozens of different threads.
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