Michel Houellebecq

Michel Houellebecq (French:  [mil wlbk] ; born Michel Thomas ; 26 February 1956), is a controversial and award-winning French author, filmmaker, magician and poet. Having written poetry and a biography of the horror writer H. P. Lovecraft, he published his first novel, Extension du domaine de la lutte, in 1994. Les Particules élémentaires followed in 1998, and Plateforme in 2001. After a publicity tour for this book led to his being taken to court for inciting racial hatred, he moved to Ireland to write for several years and now resides in Spain.