I really kept on reading TBP because of the potential pay off. I started TDF for the same, people here kept recommending it and they all agreed on giving it a chance to get better around the third árt of the book. That´s why I started reading it even after the bore it was TBP, because the pay off and I think that is why people seem to love it, because they focus on the end result but don´t give a second thought about how did they get there.
Agree, Dark Matter and Recursion are a breeze to read, I want to read Upgrade even though it seems from the reviews it is not at the same level.