LONDON, Oct 15: Australian first-time novelist and reformed drug addict D.B.C. Pierre late on Tuesday won the Booker Prize, Britain’s most famous and most coveted literary award, for his debut novel “Vernon God Little”.

Pierre, 42, who lives in Ireland, was one of six candidates on a shortlist for the annual contemporary fiction award and the 50,000 pound (71,000 euro, 79,500 dollar) prize.

His book, for which he had received a publishing deal just one hour before the first plane hit New York’s World Trade Centre on September 11, 2001, is a darkly comic tale of a Texan teenager put on trial for a high school massacre.

Pierre thanked his family for his success as he was presented with the award at a gala dinner at the British Museum in London.

“I have to thank my folks, my mum is here tonight,” he said to loud applause.

“She and the rest of my family planted the idea that I could do anything and I just want to apologise for taking it so literally up to now.”

Speaking after the ceremony, Pierre said he was compelled to write “Vernon God Little”.

“I was in the end compelled to write. It was either that or take a length of rope and hang myself in the forest,” he said.

Pierre said his next book, which was near completion, was “a European book” but declined to give further details.

The chairman of the five-strong judging panel, Professor John Carey, praised Pierre’s debut novel as “a coruscating black comedy reflecting our alarm but also our fascination with modern America”.

Pierre, whose real name is Peter Finlay, has his own dark past and recently admitted spending nine years in a drug-induced “haze”.

The writer — whose pen name initials stand for Dirty But Clean — has also admitted to selling a friend’s house and pocketing the money.

A former cartoonist, Pierre was born in Australia in 1961 and grew up in Mexico in a wealthy family. He has said his problems began aged 16 when he was put in charge of running the family’s home and wealth after his father fell ill.—AFP