Yeah, agreed Inca. I'm a big audiobook fan but I don't reckon this'd work very well in that format. You need the page in front of you to really soak up the wonderful detail that he puts in. Which isn't to say it's dense - it's a pretty light read; it's just that there were lots of passages where I thought 'wow' and immediately went back to re-read them. The last section of the novel, which covers the main bloke's later life is as good as anything I've read this year.