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Speaking of long texts, Dan Simmons’ The Rise of Endymion is 708 pages of messianic, space opera. This is technically the fourth in a series, but is really the second half of a second pair. You can reasonably read Endymion without reading Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion. The first pair of books are clearly better, principally owing to a rich literary connections to the Canterbury Tales and Keats, but the second pair is highly recommended.
The Rise of Endymion follows our protagonists, Aenea, Raul Endymion, A. Bettik, and friends as they complete their quest against an amazingly loathsome rendition of an intergalactic Catholic Church. I typically lose fascination with Messiah figures well before the crescendo of the story, but Simmons does quite a good job here. He has some of the best character development I’ve run across in my Sci-Fi/Fantasy readings. I was quite affected by the rather excruciating climax, because I was deeply invested in the characters. The final ending was really redemptive and just barely, but slickly, avoided a sickeningly cloying deus ex machina copout. All-in-all quite a good read.
If nothing else Endymion and The Rise of Endymion are worth reading for the provocative treatment of 1) how religion can be abused and 2) human life with unending resurrection.
One last thing. I’m still not sure if the question of “What is the Shrike?” was actually answered. And there were enough loose ends that I could easily see a third pair of books completing a trilogy of pairs someday.