Excellent review! Reynolds is one of my faves. For short stories, I think his best are mostly in the Revelation Space universe (most of them can be found in the collection Galactic North); he has a Best of too. Great novellas include: Diamond Dogs (chilling); The Six Directions of Space (I recall it involving an alt universe space-faring Islamic empire, very cool); Troika; and Minla's Flowers & Merlin's Gun (in the same universe).
On another note, Reynolds wrote the intro to the Gollancz Masterworks edition of The Book of the New Sun, speaking to what a huge influence it's always been on him. And that's really interesting because I'd have never guessed it. Still, that actually might be where his fascination with merged consciousnesses comes from--which we see variations of throughout much of his work. His interest in creating believable cultures on other worlds is shared by many though maybe some of that is Wolfian inspiration too. But clearly questions of identity are central to his narratives even if he doesn't quite hit the depth of Wolfe (who does?).
If you are using it to prop the door open, you might be missing out! Great review, though.