I think he's a good writer, but his big problem for me is that he can spend three or four hundred pages of set up, but it's set up for a second (or third) book, not the book where all of these pieces are being moved into place. It's not necessarily BAD set up, but he doesn't seem to provide sufficient pay off in a single book unless it's explicitly not an ongoing series (re: the difference between 'Serpent Among The Ruins' and 'Rough Beasts of Empire').
So I expect that this novel will be the pay off for his set up in Revelation and Dust, which I'm pleased about, but I'd be happy if he wrapped up the plotlines he's kicked off so that there's more room for other writers to come in and do their own thing without being concerned about setting on his toes.
I really wish we could go back to the days of ongoing narratives and rotating authors, though, like how the post-finale DS9 books used to work. There were ongoing plot threads, but still a rotating group of writers. I suppose that's just a side effect of the one book a month policy, and the cuts that have happened to the editorial staff over the years, but it's still depressing.