Early Work - a novel that gets better as it moves along

I'm giving props today to Andrew Martin, whose debut novel, Early Work (I love the title, especially as it's about a group of 20-something aspiring writers w/ varying degrees of talent and commitment), as it's one of the few contemporary novels I've read that gets better as it moves along. I was drawn in right away, as I have a lot of interest in fiction about a writer's career, but admit that, as noted in some preceding posts, I became impatient w/ the narcissism, the excessive drinking and smoking (cigarettes included), and the absence of any significant discussion among the characters re literature - what they're reading, what they're writing (or not writing). But the characters have grown on me, become more rounded and sympathetic, as Martin devotes some sections to giving their back stories (most but not all of the novel is narrated by Pete, a mostly unpublished trust-fund guy spending a lot of time not writing - and a lot of time in a sexual romp w/ beautiful and more successful writer, Leslie, while cheating on his thoroughly sympathetic girlfriend of 5 years, Julie, who's a med student working on the side on a epic poem, some of it published). As we get to know more about the characters, they win us over, flaws and all. Martin writes some really witty dialog - esp the trenchant observations of his sly narrator - and he's good at capturing the milieu of a scene, a locale, without dwelling unduly on particulars: some particularly fine passages include the painful car ride from Va to Maine in icy near-silence as Julie suspects that Pete has been untrue, Leslie's time in Missoula, and the night of debauchery and switched partners at Kenny's lakeside cottage, to name just three. Not sure why he didn't do so earlier, but in the second half of the book Martin effectively establishes Pete and Leslie as aspiring writers, as their literary talk becomes more than just name-checks (of which there are many). We feel for Pete in particular, completely stuck in his writing, which leads of course to his questioning of his entire self-worth. Nearing the end, I'm not sure how the particulars of the plot will resolve, but it's obvious that Pete's self-doubt was unfounded - it seems that the novel we're reading results from his sorrowful experiences; despite our doubts, and his, about his capacity for serious work, he's turned his life, or so it seems, into art - giving himself the last word.