The Abstinence Teacher

by Tom Perrotta
The Abstinence Teacher
book data
4,457 ratings, 3.25 average rating, 1,136 reviews (more data...)
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published
October 16th 2007 by Random House Canada

binding
Hardcover, 368 pages

isbn
0307356361    (isbn13: 9780307356369)

description
“Some people enjoy it.”

That was all Ruth had said. Even now, when she’d had months to come to terms with the fallout from this remar
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David
02/24/09
David rated it: 1 of 5 stars (review of isbn 0312363540)

bookshelves: read-in-2009
Read in February, 2009
JESUS WANTS YOU ........ TO GROW A PAIR.

Tommy, Tommy, Tommy! How did such a promising young literary stud like yourself turn out to be such an emasculated whore? When did things start to go so horribly, horribly wrong?

Let me be clear. When I picked you up at the airport in San Francisco, it was with entirely clear-eyed, realistic expectations. Let's face it. I wasn't looking for the literary love of my life. Just a two-plane romance - enough to while away the time it ta...more
Like this review?   yes   (31 people liked it)
  18 comments

Jason Pettus
02/07/08
Jason Pettus rated it: 2 of 5 stars

Read in February, 2008
(My entire review of this book is much longer than GoodReads' word-count limitations. Find the entire essay at the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com].)

As I've mentioned here a couple of times before, I've recently become a fairly big fan of movie-friendly author Tom Perrotta; for example, I found his breakthrough 2006 novel Little Children to be a surprisingly complex and subtle look at just what a horrific place the suburbs can be to some people, a stifl...more
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  3 comments

Michael
07/28/08
Michael rated it: 3 of 5 stars

Read in August, 2008
I really enjoy Tom Perrotta's writing style, and this book is no exception. His prose is smooth and easy, the kind of writing that pulls you into the story and makes you forget you're reading a book. I would compare reading Perrotta to watching an engaging movie. He's just an excellent storyteller.

That said, I have some issues with his latest, The Abstinence Teacher. The book is about a woman named Ruth, a sex ed teacher in Suburbville, USA, who sparks a controversy by responding...more
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David
11/13/07
David rated it: 1 of 5 stars

Read in November, 2007
My dad sent me this book, and also the DVD of "Little Children", which is based on his novel of the same name. Here's what I wrote him after reading it:

I went to the theater but it was packed, so I opted out, went to a coffee shop and read Perrotta's book, which I finished this morning. Really bad. If you haven't read it yet, I wouldn't bother. There was something that bothered me about Little Children that I couldn't put my finger on until now. Perrotta is trying to be...more
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Tori
02/02/09
Tori rated it: 5 of 5 stars

Read in February, 2009
When it comes to my sex life, there’s a lot my parents don’t need to know. They don’t need to know that I was deathly afraid of sex until I was almost 18 – not because of those “abstinence only” education documentaries that made sex seem like a death warrant – but because it was me giving something of myself to someone, letting them have a power over me that I wasn’t entirely comfortable with. They don’t need to know who I lost my virginity to, or what my current boyfriend and ...more
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  1 comment

Abby
10/29/07
Abby rated it: 3 of 5 stars

bookshelves: fiction
Read in November, 2007
Well.

I'm rather Tom Perrotta-obsessed. I've been known to babble on about him...over and over and over again.

I was really excited for this book to come out. I loved the concept of Ruth, a Human Sexuality teacher, being called into question for something innocent, a casual remark, and how the hyper-Christian population attacked her like she had horns and had the middle name Lucifer. And the connection between Tim, her daughter's born-again soccer coach, and Ruth are great....more
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  2 comments

Stuart Nachbar
The Abstinence Teacher Gets an A in My Grade Book

Tom Perrotta and I have two things in common: New Jersey roots and novels about sex education; his latest work, The Abstinence Teacher is the only other novel, besides my own, The Sex Ed Chronicles, that I have read which covers a subject that is still considered taboo in some social circles.

The Abstinence Teacher has two main characters: Ruth Ramsey, a divorcee’ and high school sex educator who makes one inappropriate co...more
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Matt
07/05/08
Matt rated it: 3 of 5 stars

Read in July, 2008
After LITTLE CHILDREN, this book seems totally light-weight. Definitely not a bad book, but the characters were painted a little too broadly for my tastes (Ruth's gay best friends, for example, or the stereotypical "ms. perfect" abstinence pusher).

Perrotta tries his best to present both sides of the religious debate as equally valid, but his heart really isn't in it (not that I blame him). While none of the religious characters come off as complete left-wing stereotypes, n...more
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Amanda
04/25/08
Amanda rated it: 2 of 5 stars

Read in May, 2008
Although I've been wanting to read a Tom Perrotta book for a few years, I don't think that "The Abstinence Teacher" was the best of his oeuvre to begin with. Maybe the dark satire of the film version of "Election" clouded my expectations too deeply. At any rate, I found this book to be a little flat where I hoped it would be sharp and short where I hoped it would be long. The parallel narratives, that of Ruth, a teacher coerced into proselytizing an abstinence-only curriculum...more
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Sarah
03/23/08
Sarah rated it: 4 of 5 stars

bookshelves: general-fiction
Read in May, 2008
recommends it for: Laura, Lynne, Toni
The story unfolds...It sounds like such a cliche but that truly is the best way to describe this absorbing read. Perrota does an excellent job of reeling the reader in, slowly disclosing background information and details about the main characters, all the while allowing the story to be told. Perrota never hints at his own personal position on the controversial issues raised by this novel (i.e. educating high school students about abstinence, public prayer, Christianity.) Both of the main charac...more
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  2 comments

Michael
10/19/07
Michael added it

bookshelves: unfinished
Read in January, 2008
It took me two months to NOT read this book. I don't make enough time for reading as it is and chasing a 19 month old around the apartment most days isn't helping me carve into my to-read stack. That said, and while I am a Tom Perrotta fan, I had some problems with this book. I read a couple of excellent short stories published in the last couple years that had me thinking he was headed into some seriously vaunted territory with his fiction. Say, inching toward Raymond Carver type stuff. (Mind, ...more
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Cher
03/04/09
Cher rated it: 3 of 5 stars

Read in March, 2009
The obvious confrontation in this story is between the Christian's perception of the "godlessness" and the non-Christians who perceive the Christians as zealots who push their beliefs down other's throats. However, religion aside, the bigger point seems to be an overall lack of tolerance for diversity. Aren't we all tempted to justify our own convictions and values? And in doing so, aren't we somewhat blinded to the fact that our adversaries are just doing the same?

Each ma...more
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Tony
07/15/08
Tony rated it: 2 of 5 stars

Read in July, 2008
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
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  2 comments

Kit
07/08/08
Kit rated it: 2 of 5 stars

bookshelves: peanut-m-ms
Read in July, 2008
I'm about halfway through this, and am not loving it. Maybe the ending will pull thigns together (and pull this off).

Where I am now: characters are stock characters, so am assuming the point is not character or character development, but some larger point about our culture and its issues about the roles of sexuality and religion.

A parent is shocked/distressed that their child's health ed (sex ed) teacher says that some people like oral sex (and, presumably, not so happy ...more
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  4 comments

Heather Hadlock
06/09/08
Heather Hadlock rated it: 3 of 5 stars

bookshelves: literary-novels
Read in June, 2008
hmmmm. Not scathing, not laugh-out-loud funny; comic in the positive, compassionate sense. I missed the outrageousness of some of the things Little Children. ("Slutty Kay!" still laughing over that subplot!) these characters seem real in an ordinary, everyday way. I cared about them and wanted their lives to become happier, without feeling any urgency about it. There's almost no plot; nothing dramatic happens. Fairly superficial action setpieces (busy but without much at stake dramat...more
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Yosafbridg
05/24/08
Yosafbridg rated it: 4 of 5 stars

Read in December, 2007
"A stranger might have mistaken him for a dedicated Information Sciences professional getting an early start on some important research,
but Ruth knew that he was actually scouring eBay for vintage Hasbro action figures, a task he preformed several times a day."
(wilely creatures, those (or should i say, we?) Information Sciences professionals.)
The Abstinence Teacher is the first Tom Perrotta novel i have read (though i loved the movie Election) and i quite enjoyed th...more
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Lorraine
03/05/08
Lorraine rated it: 3 of 5 stars

Read in May, 2008
recommended to Lorraine by: AnnaVR
recommends it for: Christians in book clubs
A friend suggested I read this book and tell her what I thought, because "it's different" and it was. It warrants discussion, because I don't think I can fully appreciate all of it on my own (yet I didn't like it enough to want to reread it). 3 stars because I'm torn between liking it and not liking it.

I thought the book would be more focussed on the abstinence teacher's struggles with her sex ed curriculum, but that wasn't really the focus of the book at all. It starts ...more
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Kim
02/12/08
Kim rated it: 2 of 5 stars (review of isbn 0312358334)

bookshelves: 08books
Read in February, 2008
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
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Elysabeth
01/16/08
Elysabeth rated it: 3 of 5 stars

bookshelves: book-club
Read in January, 2008
What I loved about The Abstinence Teacher:

I absolutely love shifting points of view, most especially when the writer does it so deftly that we gain important details about characters through others' observations. This is especially present in Tim's observations of Ruth and vice versa.

I also loved the way that Perrotta weaves very current, very real pop culture details into how the characters operate and go about their lives. (i.e., Ruth looks up her first lover on www.c...more
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Maggie
01/10/08
Maggie rated it: 2 of 5 stars

Read in January, 2008
Perrotta's latest installment uses public school health teachers and suburban soccer moms and dads to examine the war between liberals and evangelicals. For over ten years Ruth Ramsay let her motto of "Pleasure is good, shame is bad, and knowledge is power" guide her teaching of human sexuality; in her classroom no subject was forbidden, but the envelope is eventually pushed too far when, in response to a student's vocal disgust over oral sex, she replies, "some people enjoy it."...more
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The Abstinence Teacher (Hardcover)
The Abstinence Teacher (Paperback)
The Abstinence Teacher : A Novel. 9 CDs (Audio CD)
The Abstinence Teacher (Paperback)
The Abstinence Teacher (Paperback)







quotes from this book

"Randall kept his eyes glued to the computer screen as she approached. A stranger might have mistaken him for a dedicated Information Sciences professional getting an early start on some important research, but Ruth knew that he was actually scouring eBay for vintage Hasbro action figures…" More quotes...


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