The promotional tour for Lionel Asbo: State of England has been suspiciously quiet. The fact that Martin Amis hasn’t sworn, bitched or nominated the queen as guinea pig for euthanasia booths stirred the press into feverish levels of anticipation. Had the OAP (Old Age Provocateur) finally lost his teeth? Or was he simply biding his time before biting back?
A satire on Lionel Asbo – Wayne Rooney look-alike and dedicated chav – and his lottery win, it seems written to offend … even without subplots involving teenage pregnancy (she &”was six months gone when she sat her Eleven Plus”), incest with a thirty-something year old granny, pit bulls and acid attacks.
As a loyal Amis disciple, Nicola Barker in the Observer. , relished the un-PC premise: ‘Is it – as nay-sayers believe – a savage, uncontrolled and splenetic attack on modern British life, culture, mores and tropes? Is it a casual bit of GBH against the working classes?’ And she wasn’t disappointed, praising Lionel Asbo as offensive but delicious, a ‘big mac made from filet mignon’, at once ‘clever and ignorant and topical and sad and cruel and ridiculous and breathtaking’.
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