Vernon Subutex 1

Vernon Subutex, ancien disquaire à la dérive, ne peut guère compter que sur Alex Bleach pour l'aider à payer ses factures. Quand celui-ci meurt d'overdose, Vernon est expulsé de son appartement parisien et doit se faire héberger à droite et à gauche, sans se douter que tout le monde le recherche afin de mettre la main sur la vidéo que lui a laissée la pop star avant de mourir. Prix Anaïs Nin 2015. As if she were a manic, female counterpart to Michel Houellebecq, Virginie Despentes's novels overflow with violence, second-wave feminism, and restlessness to the point of mania. As she declared in her memoir-cum-manifesto, King Kong Theory, "being Virginie Despentes is a more interesting business than anything else going on out there." Her first novel, Baise-moi, was turned into a film full of murderous women and rape; her last novel, Apocalypse bébé (see WLT, Mar. 2011, 60), was shortlisted for the Prix Goncourt and won the Prix Renaudot; and now she is in the middle of a trilogy.

Prize history

• International Booker Prize 2018 Shortlist