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The main characters of this story do a fantastic job of portraying this to the reader, but Perrotta also makes a point of showing the negative effects of the "Virginity Consultant" and her "Safe Choices" program for teenagers. Abstinence only education is, as my social psychologist boyfriend would put it, "Empirically verified as ineffective".

I try not to be forceful with my opinions, but this is something I feel strongly enough about to share. I was fortunate enough to have parents and teachers who gave me the information I needed, and trusted me to be smart about making my own choices. My mother made sure I was covered for birth control on our insurance plan, My teacher told me in confidence that Lover's Package had the cheapest condoms and the employees were the most knowledgable about which brand was more effective , and the testing once every three months, that was my idea.

Because, believe it or not, an 18 year old can make responsible choices about sex. Oct 29, Abigail Hillinger rated it liked it Shelves: I'm rather Tom Perrotta-obsessed. I've been known to babble on about him 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. The scene where Ruth re Well. The scene where Ruth realizes that Tim is praying on after a particularly invigorating game is so well-done. And there's a but. It's well-written, because, of course, it's Tom Perrotta and he's wonderful. However, this book was so lackluster compared to his other great books Little Children!

And it was really disappointing. Maybe I should blame myself. After reading Little Children two years ago, I was already impatient for his newest book to come out. Every day circumstances and satires are, after all, what Tom Perrotta does best. But this book falls flat in several ways. Character development, for example. Ruth was two-dimensional, at best. Sure, she had her moments of fire and anger concerning her curriculum and maybe her daughters and of course, Tim's choice to pray after games , but then what? There was no depth to her, so different from the female protagonist Sarah in Little Children.

Which, of course, is Tim. The soccer scenes were long and drawn out. I skimmed through them. Maybe it's because I just don't really care about sports and don't really care to READ about sports, but I just turned my brain off during those parts. There were so many things I wanted to see expanded, mostly that I wanted more Ruth.

I wanted more Ruth and her daughters. More about her divorce, beyond the fact that she thought her marriage to Frank was always a mistake. I really liked her; it was sad to not see more of her. And what about JoAnn? GOD, would I have loved to see her got some form of comeuppance! The ending suited me just fine. I've read reviews so far where people thought it was blah, not good, and I found the opposite. I enjoyed it a lot.

I still really liked the book, despite my observations. It's still Tom Perrotta, and it's still good writing. And I still laughed out loud several times. And I will still probably re-read this book a few times, because that's how I roll. Feb 22, CD rated it did not like it Recommends it for: This book was a recommendation for our book club and I have to say it is one of the only books for that group that I think is poorly written.

What I was told I would be reading is a funny book about a clash between the health teacher at a school and the local fundamentalist Christian group. I was expecting a collision of ideas, morality, education, parents v. What I got was something else completely. It started off with the health teacher and it seemed to be progre This book was a recommendation for our book club and I have to say it is one of the only books for that group that I think is poorly written.

It started off with the health teacher and it seemed to be progressing into something interesting in spite of characters that seemed a bit wooden and more of a caricature the two gay guys. Then it split off into a story about the soccer coach who is a former rock and roller and former drug addict who is now born again and is trying to be a good Chrisian promise keeper.

What was disturbing was the not so subtle contempt that Perrotta has for Christians. On page 82 he describes how the pastor is trying to set him up with one of his young parishoners and says "Unlike most of the single women who worshipped at the Tabernacle, she was young and reasonably cute It's little digs like that that tell you he has a huge ax to grind. I have no love lost between me and promise keepers and as a librarian I am fully for banned books and the freedom to read. However, I feel like Perrotta had an opportunity to really portray a community and evoke some controversy and debate and intellectual discussion and he took the easy way out.

The easy and slimy way. The book made me feel dirty. The characters were gross, behaved badly and made decisions that overall were disgusting. Ultimately it had nothing to do with the original story. It lost its focus and its moral high ground and nothing can redeem it. I don't recommend this to anyone. Aug 17, Sarah rated it it was amazing. I love Tom Perrotta, and this book was no exception.

He writes in such a way that he makes it look easy, when it is anything but. And I love how much depth he finds in characters that other writers might see as simply stereotypes.

While not liking the book is one thing, hating it is another. I hated this book! I'm actually angry about it and it has been nearly a week since I pushed myself through it in two days. Two days is plenty of time since it would appear it took that long to write although Perrotta claims two years. What surprises me is my anger. Can we do no better than this? This book is so bad it makes me want to write because I KNOW I can do better -- but I would still be embarrassed to see my name on a novel only "better" than this one.

So why do I hate it? Let me count the ways. Ruth is the main the character and the teacher named in the title. I really do not like this person. In fact, she is much of what I do not like about people. Now let me state up front that I do not need to like the character to like the book see Updike's Rabbit , but I'm not sure why we are subjected to this person. She simply does not grow throughout the book and I doubt her future life will turn out any better.

Once the renegade, super-cool sex ed teacher, she is now forced to teach a boring and unrealistic abstinence course after some right-wing Christians and yes, there are left-wing Christians sue the school. So she shows up the first day in a slinky outfit to quietly protest this change. This would be humorous if she was 16 years old, but when you hit your 40s, well, grow up! She is a lousy mother more interested in her own life than that of her children, a whiny school teacher and person, and a fierce hater of Christianity possibly due to the right-wing opposition to her sex ed, but that is never clear.

Seriously, her children going to church terrifies her and they know it -- she does not support anything they do which she does not also like. I should have quit reading at Ruth Ramsey's reflection that in college "she majored in Psychology and minored in Doritos.


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Are there no editors left in the world. Who lets such a stupid line through! Apparently everyone since this book is full of such phrases. Perrotta fills space with plots which begin and are either never resolved or leave us wondering why it was there. So she has a bad sexual encounter with her high school fling 30 years later.

Why did we need to know this? What purpose does it serve? Perrotta had already reached the pulp factor in number of pages, so why torment us some more? Ruth Ramsey's daughters are interesting, but we'll never know how much because he primarily uses them as foils for Ruth; he starts a story line with them and just drops them off at the end. On a side note, I'm really wondering how they will handle the mother's final love interest. She is working hard to mess these kids up.


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  • Maybe this is where my anger really lies. In an interview with Perrotta at the back of my edition he is asked if this book will be a "grenade tossed into the culture wars? I approached the book thinking this would be interesting. Teaching abstinence fails and all the research shows this. Perrotta has grabbed an issue which could make a phenomenal book and completely missed the chance.

    This book is not about culture wars, it is about some annoying people who have messed up their lives and will likely continue to mess up their lives. The battle over the sex ed is past history in this novel and we just get a quick summary. The woman running the new abstinence push is interesting, but there is no show down except for when Ramsey fails so often she is reassigned she should be fired -- people like this [stupid: The closest we get to a showdown is when the coaches pray at the end of a soccer game a couple of times.

    Perrotta even tries to build up the climax finally, I thought , but then the final praying scene does not even occur in the book. This is about culture wars? I'll stop here at number four, but I could go on e. So is there anything good about the book? Tim Mason is an interesting character and gasp! He is supposed to be other half of the culture war, representing the right wing Christian angle.

    A recovering addict to several addictions his new found faith offers him some support, but even more guilt. But he is humble in his own way and in the end he is actually honest with himself. It is his humility and honesty which allow him to move forward while all the characters remain in one place. Now I may be alone on this one. The New York Times blurb says "Perrotta is a truth-telling, unshowy chronicler of modern-day America. And by the way, my oldest two are not off the hook for this.

    Dual Review - The Ocean at the End of the Lane & The Abstinence Teacher

    My oldest son gave it to my daughter for Christmas mistake one and my daughter thought I would like it mistake two. My son is claiming the whole "I'm just the messenger" line, but anyone promoting this type of literature will need to spend extra time in purgatory. As for my daughter, lover of great classics including Jane Austen, the Bronte sisters, and so many other great works -- what were you thinking!

    Fortunately, I'm a forgiving person. Mar 01, Kim rated it liked it. Ya know, I liked this book but the ending kinda left me feeling unfulfilled. Jan 10, Maggie rated it it was ok. 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. In the aftermath of this controversy, Ruth meets her daughter's soccer coach - a former addict turned born-again evangelical Christian named Tim Mason, who unwittingly creates a huge mess the day he decided to lead his multi-faithed, community soccer team in prayer right before Ruth's very eyes.

    What follows is the story of an unlikely friendship born from the controversy, and a book that pretty much bored me throughout. I admit that my knowledge of Perrotta's storytelling is limited to film versions of two of his novels Election, Little Children , but on the power of these two films and reviewers' commentaries I was expecting The Abstinence Teacher to be sharp, witty, mildly satirical, and funny when it needed to be. Instead, the story played a bit like a Lifetime Original Movie, none of the characters were particularly likable, barring one moment that I found mildly amusing it was decidedly unfunny, and I probably would not have finished it if it were not for the sake of this review which I now write.

    Perhaps I'm being a bit harsh, but in a word - meh. You can do better. Mar 30, Amy rated it really liked it. Perrotta's characters are so interesting. I liked the story and this book was full of surprising little observations and witticisms. My favorite was probably, "She majored in psychology and minored in Doritos. When he asked why, she said, He's successful," and he answers that that didn't mean he wasn't a bad person. That's funny in today's cont Perrotta's characters are so interesting.

    That's funny in today's context. One of my favorite things about Perrotta's writing is that he captures undefinable and unexpected relationships between his characters in a way that mimics real life. He is also skilled at creating subtle sexual tension between his characters, which makes their interactions more weighted and intriguing.

    A word isn't just a word and neither is a look or a touch. I like life like that. 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: Tim is struggling to stay along the straight and narrow path, as defined for him by the very same evangelical leader who torments Ruth.

    They are both searching for self-worth through someone else. Tim has tried to embrace a Christian life, though his sexual desires for his ex-wife and unhappiness in his second marriage lead him to doubt his piety. Tim repeatedly returns to Pastor Dennis to reconcile his adopted faith.

    The Abstinence Teacher by Tom Perrotta

    Tim and Carrie, his second wife, try to find sexual bliss under a church-defined set of rules; the rules for shopping, for instance, try to draw a fine line between naughty and nice. In her private moments, she doubts her own sexuality, wondering if love, or just plain good sex, will elude her for the rest of her life. Ruth objects, drawing further wrath from the Tabernacle faithful. Her first clash led her principal and superintendent to institute an abstinence-only sex education course that she lacks the heart to teach.

    Her second compromises her relationships with her two daughters: Unlike my work, The Sex Ed Chronicles, which takes place in , a time before sex education had been adopted in many public schools; Teacher is based in our times. Teacher devotes more attention to the culture of fundamentalist Christianity than the art, science and politics of teaching sex education in public schools.

    In Teacher, sex education is a regular part of the school day. In reading Teacher and Chronicles back to back, I noticed similarities. Both novels position sex educators under the belief that knowledge is power and show that sex education is too important and too difficult a subject to teach poorly in the classroom. In Teacher and Chronicles, the teachers are also asked to swallow some pride. I will only say that Ruth is asked to swallow harder.

    KIRKUS REVIEW

    Chronicles and Teacher share concerns about abstinence-only sex education being something that is watered down and therefore, not taking too seriously—unless it is consistent with the teachings of their family or place of worship. However, sex education outside of the public schools is less consistent from student to student, than inside the classroom—and both sides of the culture wars acknowledge this point. Then the academic questions that come from reading Teacher and Chronicles are who provides the views that will dominate, and not demonize, public school sex education?

    Which minority view will take center stage in a theatre where parents and students are a silent majority? Will it be activist conservatives they are not all Christians; Orthodox Jews and Muslims share deep seeded objections to comprehensive sex education or activist educators perceived to be liberal, or is it more appropriate to say, sexually liberated?

    And, do students and school administrators really care about the material taught in those classes? The Abstinence Teacher made me more concerned for the professional well-being and skin thickness of sex educators who work in settings similar to Ruth. A teacher cannot teach well when forced to suppress their own values to protect faculty colleagues from embarrassment. Jun 05, Imogen rated it it was ok. I remembered Jessa from Bookslut going off about this book for a long time, so I was excited to read it, but goodreads, I can't lie to you: One, there is no enemy, and two, duh!

    Obviously evangelical Christians are real people. I hated the Gra I remembered Jessa from Bookslut going off about this book for a long time, so I was excited to read it, but goodreads, I can't lie to you: I hated the Grateful Dead listenin' ex-drug addict who, I guess, finds salvation and love when he goes back off the wagon? I didn't really believe in the sex ed teacher divorced soccer mom, or in her total caricature, marriage-obsessed gay friends.

    And if you are going to show that evangelical Christians are real people, you can't have ground zero for their church be a ridiculous deus ex machina like something out of Spawn and then a blacked-out smashing up of a Best Buy. The guy behind the church we're learning about is a cartoon. It's like Mr Perrota decided to talk about Issues and thought he was smart enough that that would carry the book. But none of the details ring true at all- in the part where the married Christians are reading the book about how to have hot Christian sex, and they get to the part about how there's nothing in the bible against cross-dressing?

    Don't just make shit up? You know who this reminds me of? At one point I got a wild hair and read his three books, and liked them, and in retrospect I have no idea why. Upper middle class white dude angst? Band names and song titles?

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    I would give it one star except, y'know, I read the whole thing. Maybe Jessa was talking shit when she was talking about this? Just 'cause, y'know, that's the two word description of what this book's about, and it would look rad on an amaturishly screen-printed t-shirt. Mar 29, Maisha Rho rated it liked it. This book was very difficult for me to read. It was a very mature book and I'm glad that I finished it. It was hard for me to find the main parts of the story because there was three parts of the story. It is about these two people.

    One is named Ruth and the other one is named Tim. Tim is a recovering drug and alcohol addict and he is recovering with God's help. He is a soccer coach and is This book was very difficult for me to read. He is a soccer coach and is trying to figure out his life because he was also divorced and his daughter is inching away from hi too. He prays with his students and that starts controversy with moms and kids. Ruth doesn't believe in that so it starts trouble with her too. Ruth is a sex ed teacher and loses that job because she didn't teach it well so they made her quit and be a math teacher even though she is bad at math.

    Tim is married again but he still loves his ex who has moved on. At the end of the book, Time and Ruth have a little spark, but it just ends right there. This book was very confusing, an hard to follow through, but I like it. Read it if you would like. Jul 08, Kit rated it it was ok Shelves: 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: I don't care much about the characters, actually, so don't feel invested in whether or not they have a revelation moment.

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    And I'm thinking not-so-much for us, because it's so broadly drawn. But will keep reading, just in case. Maybe this is a draft of a screenplay? Maybe if you had compelling actors take on these characters, the characters would be more 'real' and more interesting? Maybe if you had a strong editor you could structure the storyline so that it, um, worked? But a fast read, if anyone's got it in his or her tote bag for the beach Because this bugged me so bad -- but stop reading right now if you don't want anything 'spoilerish' I couldn't stand the scene where the health teachers go in for re-indoctrination in the abstinence curriculum.

    The facilitator tells them to write down their sexual experience they're most ashamed of and then they're supposed to read these aloud to the group. Wouldn't a group of experienced sex ed teachers know how to just say NO to being 'coerced' into sharing a private experience? Couldn't one of them have gracefully objected to the assignment on the grounds that they see their sex lives as their personal business and not fodder for the abstinence curriculum?

    Jul 05, Matt rated it liked it. 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. 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, none of them come off looking particularly wonderful either I think my biggest regret about this book is that we never see the second half of Tim's "growth," so to speak.

    Tim is by far the most complex and interesting character in the book, and at the exact moment that Tim seems poised to have to deal with all of these issues he's brought up in his life and the results of the decisions he's made, Perrotta slams on the brakes. I just happened to come across this quote from Nick Hornby while reading his blog tonight: But you might end up understanding a little more. Mar 23, Sarah rated it really liked it Recommends it for: 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. Both of the main charac The story unfolds Both of the main characters are deeply flawed so there is no clean cut division of good and evil.

    Instead, the players are wholly believable and human, the issues cloudy and multi-faceted. The story begins slowly, alternating its focus between Ruth and Tim. As the tempo picks up the passages about each character become increasingly brief, almost as though the two are pitted against each other in a boxing ring. First, Perrota is overly fond of the hyphen to the point where I found it distracted my reading of the novel. The second problem is that the story seems to end so abruptly. There is a terrific build-up, a crescendo, then bam! This is not to say that some of the loose ends weren't tied up.

    Overall, engrossing and well-executed. I started this book more of curiosity and certainly I never thought it would be a page-turner. The story revolves around two characters - Ruth Ramsey, an agnostic sex education teacher in a not so conservative northeast US town and Tim Mason, a former rock bassist with a history of drug and alcohol abuse who has recently found Jesus and the way their paths cross. It has all the ingredients of a good book: Most impressive of all - Tom Perrotta does not take a side, with a surgical precision he gives equal voice and creditability of both the evangelical Christianity and the secular agnostics.

    No fingers pointed, Perrotta does not draw easy conclusions. And that is the ultimate respect towards the reader. Feb 09, Lindsey Dean rated it did not like it Shelves: The only good thing this book had going for it was that it was well written enough that I finished it.

    But that's about it. Frustrating content and a story that waffled at best and was a yarn ball of loose ends and unfinished sentences and NO climax at worst. Coming to the end, I wish I hadn't bothered. Ugh, no the more I think about it the more annoyed I am at having this clunky, unsatisfying story in my brain. ZERO stars, abandoned halfway. As a sex-positive feminist and musician in a Christian rock band, I thought the abstinence argument would be an interesting minor conflict in the middle of a fun, silly rom-com.

    Instead, this book was disgustingly problematic: Oct 24, Melissa rated it liked it. Ruth Ramsey is the Sex Ed teacher at a local high school. She firmly believes that providing kids with a strong knowledge of safe sex practices will result in them coming to mature decisions.

    Knowledge is power, after all. Fun read, interesting subject matter. I read this in one sitting, which makes it clear that the plot kept me interested. On the other hand, I'm never soul-satisfied without a greater level of character development. The two strands that most interested me were 1 the story line about the committed, experienced sex-ed teacher who's suddenly forced, as a result of school board politics, to teach abstinence-only and 2 the more slowly emerging connection between this woman and another parent who ostensibly have radically different views and positions but who both have a more subtle side that lets them take in realities that are more complex than their world views might suggest.

    So - a good read, well-written, not necessarily a masterpiece - hence, the three solid stars. This is pretty typical Tom Perrotta dark satire of American suburbia. The book on the whole is a very readable exploration through its two main characters, Ruth and Tim, of the desperation of entering middle age in the suburbs with the feeling that everything good is done and in the past and that your best days are behind you, of thirsting for the chance to start all over again. I thought Perrotta did a good job drawing out the parallels with these two characters, who start off from such very, very different places on the surface and are inevitably although realistically and not in grand romantic fashion drawn to each other in spite of the divide between them.

    You can actually see where these two, beyond rule of lead characters, would have common ground. You can see how it might fill the empty spaces for Dennis and Carrie and John, and in a healthy way. Finally, this is very much a book about sex and the way we talk and think about it in this culture, the way it impacts individual lives and our politics, the way it drives all of us and shapes our relationships, its power and why some people feel such a need to try to restrain that power.

    I wasn't totally blown away by the book but found it enjoyable enough where I would likely pick up something else by Tom Perrotta. I have also come to the conclusion after reading it that Perrotta is sort of the Christian Jodi Picoult. If you like Picoult's writing you probably will like what Perrotta has to offer as well as they write in a similar matter of fact style with a deeper than normal look into the lives of the main characters. The book centers around two interesting characters--Ruth and Tim.

    Ruth is a sex education teacher at a local high school who one could say is extremely literal and detailed in her profession. When kids ask questions, she gives answers and she doesn't hold back much to the dismay of many in the increasingly right-wing Christian influenced community. Tim is the local soccer coach.

    He coaches both his daughter and Ruth's daughter on the team and he himself has had an interesting background coming from being a washed up junkie to finding God, marrying someone he probably doesn't love, and becoming close with the local church. Ruth and Tim become closer and closer and the story culminates with both Ruth and Tim making some significant decisions that change both of their lives and that of their families.

    The book is a quick read albeit maybe 50 pages too long in my opinion. I enjoyed it moderately and would recommend it to anyone looking for an enjoyable weekend read.

    Questions?

    One person found this helpful. Perrotta's "The Abstinence Teacher" is a character study about two people coming from quite different perspectives. Ruth Ramsey is a sex education teacher struggling with a vocal group of religious citizens who are hellbent on forcing the school to teach an abstinence-only program. The author's sympathies clearly lie with Ms. Keeping kids ignorant about sexuality and spreading fallacies about contraception and masturbation is a dangerous and illogical strategy. This seems pretty obvious to me but, hey, I'm agnostic. However, aaaaah, we are also dealing with religious zealots here.

    The second main character, Tim Mason, is a more troubled, conflicted person who unintentionally causes problems during an year-old, girl soccer game which he coaches. Instead of portraying Tim Mason as a one-dimensional, religious foil to Ms. Ramsey, the author goes to pains in describing why Mason became born-again. I found the two main characters to be funny but somewhat annoying.

    Tim Mason's confusion and lack of spine might have seemed necessary for him to fall into the web of pinhead Pastor Dennis' little, religious clique, but it got old after awhile. The story swirls around what should be the boundaries for religion and sexual education when they fall into the public venue?

    Regrettably, the story never resolves itself to a satisfying conclusion. You're just hanging there at the end wondering what's next for Ruth Ramsey and Tim Mason? I enjoyed the novel but felt short-changed with its conclusion. There will probably be a few, frustrated readers who will chuck this baby across the room when they get to the end of it.

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