Sexy Sadie

I've had a copy of Sadie Jones' The Outcast for a couple of months and only just got around to reading it. I got it at The Organ's and Random House's Book Video Awards, which celebrated three trailers for RH books made by film students, one for The Outcast. The trailer is pretty good, actually, although it wasn't my favourite.

I hadn't gotten around to reading the book maybe because after the awards we had so many in the office. Piles and piles - couldn't give them away. But after she got nominated for the Orange, I figured I would give it a bash. And I'm glad I did - it's one of the best debuts I've read in some time. Taut, menacing and claustrophobic, it concerns 19-year-old Lewis returning to his Surrey home after a couple years in Brixton Prison.

Lewis went off the rails after seeing his mother drown when he was 10; he drank, self-harmed, got into fights and eventually torches the local church. His return leads to palpable unease in the town, a constant suggestion of violence.

Essentially, The Outcast is an attack of the hypocrisy of post-war middle class Britain. The most violent man in the village is the wife and child beating Dicky Carmichael, the richest man in the area, whose crimes are protected by his status and complicit wife.

There are some quibbles - the last line you can see coming down from a long way off and some of the scenes are melodramatic in an East Enders sort of way. But it's a debut and we can forgive these slips. Well worth picking it up. And we still have plenty of copies at the office.