George seemed to have two "periods" in his writing. This is from the earlier phase: light, clever, playing with ideas (I can't remember whether or not this is the one where they wrapped the Moon in duct-tape in order to crash it into the Earth...). The later phase - When Gravity Fails and its sequels - is darker and richer, with deeper characterization. When he was good, he was brilliant.
Still struggling with Facebook here, and trying to carve out time to start up a Dreamwidth account. Anyone who has insight about Instagram, please share.