The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki was a commitment. The audiobook was 18 hours and 50 minutes long! I listened at a faster speed and it was still very long! Truth be told, if this wasn’t a ToB book, I would have DNF’d it. I thought the very beginning was compelling. 12-year-old Benny’s father is killed when he is run over by a chicken truck in the alley behind their home. Shortly after, Benny begins hearing the voices of inanimate objects, while his mom Annabelle starts hoarding. After the opening, I found the book to be a slog for quite awhile. It moved really slowly for a really long time, with extreme levels of details that IMO didn’t add much. I didn’t care about the characters at all for awhile. It was kind of like a book with no form, just emptiness. Eventually, it picked up - more characters were introduced, and I did start to care by the last 1/3 of the book. The very end was great! Everything came together beautifully. I finally cared about Benny and Annabelle. It just took so long to get there. I would only recommend this if you’re already a fan of Ozeki’s writing, or if you really enjoy detailed descriptions and don’t mind a slow plot. I listened to the audiobook, and I do think the narrator was pretty good overall, but I found the voices that he did for Annabelle made me unsympathetic to her. I think I would have felt for her more in print.