September Reading and Listening Recommendation

Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre
Pierre is an Australian writer and Vernon God Little was his first book, for which he won the 2003 Booker Prize. To simplify this book it satirizes what those who have never been to America that think they know what America is about from watching stereotyped productions of the lower class and trailer parks or the American representation in news programs. Vernon G. Little, the protagonist has been compared to Holden Caulfield of Catcher in the Rye and Ignatius J. Reilly of A Confederacy of Dunces. It was described by the Booker Prize judges as a "coruscating black comedy reflecting our alarm but also our fascination with America" ("Author Pierre wins Booker prize", BBC, October 15, 2003).
It is set in a fictitious small town in Texas, less than a week from when Vernon G. Little’s only friend Jesus Navarro committed suicide after first killing 16 class bullies. Vernon is fingered as the scapegoat since there is no one to convict for the crime.
DBC Pierre is the pen name of Peter Warren Finley who claims to have written the book primarily to exercise his own guilt ridden demons of his youth and one particular moment where he had conned an elderly artist out of his home.


Powder Burns by The Twilight Singers
Recording on Powder Burns began in singer/songwriter Greg Dulli’s adopted home New Orleans before Katrina’s destruction and continued immediately afterwards using generators. This isn’t an album about Hurricane Katrina, but as a good portion of the songs were written after the fact, the influence is there. The first song is an instrumental called “Towards the Waves” which has been described as “represent(ing) the calm before the storm” (Harmonium.com). In “There’s Been an Accident” Dulli sings, ‘I’m alive, it kinda took me by surprise/but everytime I look away, there’s no light/ there’s no sentry at the gate’. Similar emotions can be drawn out in “Underneath the Waves”, “Powder Burns” and “I Wish I Was”. As each one of these songs has been connected to the obvious link of Katrina, they have all likewise been connected to Greg Dulli’s recent sobriety. Since I haven’t been able to find a quote from Dulli himself, you can pick whichever back story you prefer, whether it be the timeless tale of the drug-addled rockstar who finds redemption through sobriety or the untold tale of the rockstar clinging to the nearest tree while the vicious barrage of Mother Nature’s fury is unleashed on him and his neighbors. Redemption through sobriety has a happy ending, while sorting out the why’s and how’s of Katrina falls more in the category of we’re damned because we haven’t.