Try studying the Plantagenets by reading Shakespeare's King John, or even World War I by reading All Quiet on the Western Front. You will often see fabrications, inconsistencies, errors and above all, you will see a particular view that is limited in scope and perspective. While War and Peace may be a fun read, it doesn't really give people the reality of the Napoleonic era.

I find it amusing that you have found some explanation for the monotony of the book. I find your excuse for the poor style used in the book to be inadequate, and of course it fundamentally ignores the key point that the style remains monotonous whether or not it is explained, and that monotony renders the book unreadable to a great many people. Furthermore, if one has to delve into the minutiae of the politics of an insignificant country to even begin to understand the bizarre actions of a family in a work of fiction, I think the criticism of character motivations can and should stand.

I may perhaps be overly critical of this book because it was universally praised with such signal and obsequious effusions of compliments and hyperbole that, when I read it, I could not help but be underwhelmed and note the irritating flaws that for me made it virtually unreadable. If I had expected less I might have been less critical.

I think ultimately that my problem with Eco is his fascination with the grotesque. It was a minor and acceptable part of The Name of the Rose and almost non-existent in Foucault's Pendulum, which I like the best out of what he wrote, but very prominently on display in Baudolino. His Infinity of Lists at times reads like the source material for his books, and I picked up once again on his infatuation with the grotesque and repulsive.