MAN BOOKER PRIZE WINNER 2016
‘Outrageous, hilarious and profound.’ Simon Schama, Financial Times
‘The longer you stare at Beatty's pages, the smarter you'll get.’ Guardian
‘The most badass first 100 pages of an American novel I've read.’ New York
Times A biting satire about a young man's isolated upbringing and the race
trial that sends him to the Supreme Court, The Sellout showcases a comic genius
at the top of his game. Born in Dickens on the southern outskirts of Los
Angeles, the narrator of The Sellout spent his childhood as the subject in his
father's racially charged psychological studies. He is told that his
father's work will lead to a memoir that will solve their financial woes. But
when his father is killed in a drive-by shooting, he discovers there never was a
memoir. All that's left is a bill for a drive-through funeral. What's more,
Dickens has literally been wiped off the map to save California from further
embarrassment. Fuelled by despair, the narrator sets out to right this wrong
with the most outrageous action conceivable: reinstating slavery and segregating
the local high school, which lands him in the Supreme Court.
In his trademark absurdist style, which has the uncanny ability to make readers
want to both laugh and cry, The Sellout is an outrageous and outrageously
entertaining indictment of our time.
Author Biography
PAUL BEATTY is the author of the novels Slumberland, Tuff, The White Boy Shuffle
and The Sellout, which has been shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2016. He
is also the author of two books of poetry, Big Bank Take Little Bank and Joker,
Joker, Deuce, and is the editor of Hokum: An Anthology of African-American
Humor. He lives in New York City.