Jesus' Son

Jesus' Son is a collection of short fiction by Denis Johnson published in 1992 by Farrar, Straus & Giroux. A short story cycle comprising 11 pieces, Jesus' Son is Johnson's most critically acclaimed and popular literary effort, and the work with which Johnson is most identified. In 1999, it was adapted into a film of the same name by Elizabeth Cuthrell, David Urrutia, and Oren Moverman, directed by Alison Maclean. Stories "Car Crash While Hitchhiking" "Two Men" "Out on Bail" "Dundun" "Work" "Emergency" "Dirty Wedding" "The Other Man" "Happy Hour" "Steady Hands at Seattle General" "Beverly Home" Subject matter The book takes its title from the Velvet Underground song "Heroin", and concerns the exploits of several addicts living in rural America, as they engage in drug use, petty crime, and murder. The stories are linked by shared locations (such as a dive bar in small-town Iowa) and repeated imagery. They are all narrated by a troubled young man identified only as "Fuckhead" ("Emergency"). The book is known for its seemingly chaotic narrative style, which mirrors the mental state of its narrator and the disjointed perception of an addicted, drug-addled mind.