Years ago I read a book on English soccer hooligans, Among the Thugs, which, as horrifying as it was, described a subculture. With Lionel Asbo: State of England, Martin Amis tells us (in the subtitle, for starters) that those pathologies have gone mainstream. He paints a culture of gutter poor and gutter rich melded into one fetid stew, stirred along by the gutter (and "quality") press. The satire can be heavy-handed, but no one who has enjoyed, say, Tom Sharpe's South Africa novels will recoil. Amis also lets in a pinpoint of light to combat the darkness.
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