Just some thoughts about Those Barren Leaves which can also be applied to Huxley's first two novels: great satire (it did make me laugh), rather boring characters, not much in terms of a plot (but it gets better), the necessary use of at least two foreign and/or anciant languages (because that's Huxley and that's what he does).
To sum up: I feel like I don't have much to say about Those Barren Leaves because it is so much like Crome Yellow. But I like Huxley's style and I don't think that reading his early works and seeing the development of the ideas that will later be expressed in Brave New World is a waste of time.