Vernon God Little

Vernon God Little is the first novel by the writer DBC Pierre, published in 2003. It won the Man Booker Prize that year, and it has twice been adapted for the stage.

Vernon Little is an ordinary teenager living in Martirio, Texas, when his best friend Jesus Navarro shoots a group of students in the schoolyard and then kills himself. Vernon is taken in for questioning, and because he had been running an errand for a teacher at the time and had nothing to do with the killings, he cooperates with the deputy who questions him.

The town comes under a media siege, and Vernon's position does not hold. His mother's friend Pam takes him out for a meal against his better judgment, which lets the police claim that he is a flight risk, and a man who says he is a reporter promises to help him recast his story and then betrays him. The novel is told in Vernon's own voice and in the idiom of a Texas teenager.