I got into the 300s and just can't go on. Its too boring. I don't care at all about any of the characters, or the mythology. Borrowed so much from the Greeks that it would have been better not to rename them. It's an interesting idea, linking the founders of Rome with Troy and connecting that all the way to Caesar Augustus. But I just don't care. 
 Ok well if Richard Ford says it great I should at least finish it. And since I won't be reading a lot of Roman classics and it does give the mythology of Rome in the last half of the book I will read that. 
 Ok so I finished it, though admittedly,scanning large swathes of the prose, still finding too close a resemblance to Homer. 
 Except I loved the last two "Books" and found them different. First a heroine doing battle. Awesome. While Homer had his Goddesses battling, there were no female warriors. Kudos to Virgil...not so much for the whole gender equality thing, but having the radical notion that women down to mothers on the ramparts up to Camilla would indeed fight side by side with their men if home and hearth are at stake. 
 I love the ending. Virgil keeps us in suspense and plays upon every emotion....anger, bloodlust, revenge, pity, mercy, etc....to the final "pre-Hollywood" Hollywood moment. 
 Glad I read it all!