Vernon God Little.

Unfortunately I left this behind by accident while traveling so I did not get to finish. Probably got a third of the way through. Reminded me a lot of catcher in the rye: the protagonist is a crude cynical whiny little teenage boy, surrounded by ugly stupid corrupt oppressive adults. I didn't enjoy CitR and I didn't think much of this one either (obvious caveat that I didn't finish). In this book the narrator constantly says "fucken'" instead of "fucking" - in trainspotting the dialogue is written in phonetic Scottish accents or dialects and it's brilliant - this however fucking sucks.

What a ride. Brilliantly executed.

Wow, what a ride.

The language is simplistic and unusual. Imagine a bastard love child of "The Curious Incident..." and some early Bukowski. It's straight, to the point, it's an easy read, without any kind of pretense, and all of these things I enjoyed a lot. Coming to this from some William S Burroughs (which I couldn't even bring myself to finish) this was a very nice refreshing change.

But most of all I enjoyed the story more than the tone. A (negative) review below described it as choreographed reality TV taken to the extreme like a parody. I couldn't agree except that I enjoyed that aspect of it a lot.

Without being too over-the-top, and remaining set in reality, it was a pretty damning tale of 21st century American modern life.

It kept me engaged throughout and I look forward to keeping an eye on the author.