Thankyou, I picked up on this to. It amuses me that someone can know quite a bit about the theory and then completely miss the most obvious flaw in his idea. The ridiculous mass of objects, however, is (theoretically) true.
but yeah, there may be a reason to make your interstellar ships have small cross-sectional area ... and ice shields ... wonders why he forgot to take an Alastair Reynolds book on vacation
I just finished reading Redemption Ark, that leaves Absolution Gap and The Prefect. Only a good 2000+ pages to go!