I think I agree both books were good and "A Deepness In The Sky" was better, but I would warn everyone that I thought both books used dramatic irony (showing us that characters were evil while hiding this from main characters) to hold attention to a degree that I kind of hated. And in "A Deepness In The Sky" sexual violence was used repeatedly to illustrate how evil the main characters were. I found it unnecessarily and a bit in poor taste.

On the other hand I think both books developed ideas wonderfully and there are bits of them I keep coming back to, even if I'll probably never reread them