D7 nodereference: customizable validate, taxonomy-like widget?

So, I have a need for nodereference in a site I'm working on (http://www.disobey.com/node/1864) and, naturally, there's no node reference module that currently exists for D7, save CCKs. And, honestly, most of the other node reference modules go a little overboard for me, so I'm trying to shoehorn my needs into nodereference for d7, and running up against two problems:

• node_reference_autocomplete_validate() is too evil. In my particular case, I need to create a node if the typed title doesn't exist. However, as _validate() is written now, there's no way I can do this, even with a form_alter: my user will always get a nasty error message. So, I'm wondering if there's anyway we could get some extra hook at this level, which allows other modules to determine the $reference. Perhaps this already exists: can I somehow detect the query in _node_reference_potential_references_standard(), check to see if there were any results and, if none, quickly create a node and return that as a reference? If that's not an option, some sort of drupal_alter() hook on $reference would be great!
• The other major problem is the UI - I don't want one input box per reference. In my use case, my nodes are all people: Morbus Iff, John Doe, Jane Doe, etc. I don't want to have to type that in, tab, type another in, tab, type another in, tab, etc., nor do I want the inputs cluttering up the form UI (or forcing me to type, click "Add another field", type again, etc.). Ideally, I'm looking for a taxonomy like field, where one could type in ["Morbus Iff, Jr.", John Doe, "Microsoft, LLC"], have three separate node titles looked for, and/or (per the bullet above) created, then returned.

Any thoughts on how I could accomplish the above?