There is a little too much repetition of the restrictive vocabulary of a cursing Texan teenager, while at other times the voice seems overly poetic. However, their meeting ends when Leona (Vernon's mom's friend) turns out to be Taylor's cousin and turns up to meet her. On the run in Mexico after being wrongly accused of involvement in the mass shooting of pupils at his school, he walks down an Acapulco boulevard. About to jump off the known world, Vern is caught on the hooks of his lust for the divine but two-faced Taylor Figueroa, and hauled back to face trial for the murders not only of his classmates, but of anyone else unlucky enough to be killed in Texas during the days he was on the run.

Vernon God Little | Young Vic website Vernon God Little | Young Vic website

There's been a Columbine-style killing-spree at the local high school, but the killer is dead -- and "because he's dead, and they can't fucken kill him for it, they have to find a skate-goat. Some other review of this says - quote - as the novel unfolds, Pierre's parodic version of American culture never crosses the line into caricature - unquote and I say - uh, WHAT? There are glimmers of promise here: some good ideas, mainly, and aspects of Vernon's life that Pierre handles well.Flown back to Houston, Vern stands accused of 34 murders; his TV image is so familiar that viewers even connect him to others (the “suggestibility” factor).

Lone star | Books | The Guardian Lone star | Books | The Guardian

What actually happened that fateful day is barely mentioned for much of the book; unfortunately, it's not because of the sheer, overwhelming horror of it. Vernon Little's best friend, Jesus Navarro, has just shot 16 of his classmates before turning the gun on himself. John Carey, Merton Professor of English Literature at University of Oxford and chairman of Man Booker judges in 2003, said: "Reading [Pierre's] book made me think of how the English language was in Shakespeare's day, enormously free and inventive and very idiomatic and full of poetry as well.Also nominated were Margaret Atwood, who won in 2000, plus Damon Galgut, Zoe Heller, Clare Morrall, and bookies' favourite Monica Ali. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents.

Vernon God Little, By DBC Pierre By DBC Nick Hern Books | Vernon God Little, By DBC Pierre By DBC

In 2005, Variety reported that Pawel Pawlikowski was working on producing a film adaptation of the book, with FilmFour Productions. Vernon wasn't there when the massacre happened: his teacher sent him on an errand, and his loose bowels make for an embarrassing alibi -- so embarrassing he (ridiculously) refuses to mention it for far too long. Vernon also seems far too unaffected by what happened, in contrast to his day-to-day concerns (of escape and survival) over most of the book. As she approaches, light from a doorway snags a Bar-B-Chew Barn box in her arms, along with a bag of my clothes, and a phone that she tries to speak into.

It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment…. After his victory on Tuesday, Pierre told BBC News Online just how desperate he had felt when he began writing the book. Americans make temptingly large targets for satire these days -- what with the chronic obesity and all -- but I'll be double-dog-darned if we're quite this easy to skewer. Eulalio ("Lally") Ledesma, supposedly a CNN reporter, ingratiates himself to Doris, Vernon's Mom, and promises to help Vernon "shift the paradigm" of his story. But all I whiff, over the sweat and the barbecue sauce, is school - the kind of pulse bullyboys give off when they spot a quiet one, a wordsmith, in a corner.