The Abstinence Teacher

Perrotta, Tom

ISBN 10: 1602850755 ISBN 13: 9781602850750

Publisher: Center Point Pub, 2007

Synopsis

Stonewood Heights is the perfect place to raise children. It's a place where parents are involved in their children's lives -- coaching sports, driving carpools, and taking an interest in the local schools. Two divorced parents who play a part in the lives of many children are about to launch a culture war at Stonewood Heights.

Ruth Ramsey is the human sexuality teacher at the local high school. Her daughter's soccer coach, Tom Mason, is a former bad boy who hit rock bottom and was saved. Now a member of the local evangelical Christian church that sees Ruth Ramsey and her sex ed classes as a target, the two become bitter adversaries. But when controversy on the soccer field forces them to actually talk to each other, an uneasy friendship begins to develop.

About this title

Review:

'Highly entertaining...At heart, this very funny, very engaging novel poses a question that seems all too pertinent in our Manichean times – why are we afraid of doubts and the mess that is human existence? And why, oh why, does there have to be a goddam answer to everything?' The Times

‘An expectedly serious, fair–minded and humane look at a lonely woman and a searching man. It is surprising and unusually loving towards its characters. Perrotta is especially good on that thorniest of questions, why Americans are so drawn to evangelical Christianity.' Guardian

‘The Abstinence Teacher is an entertaining exposé of the visible disparity between America's unconquerable Puritanism and its still less conquerable wellsprings of sexual desire.' Arena

'A good writer who has produced a novel of ideas, centred around the culture wars that currently convulse the United States.' The Tablet

Praise for his previous books:

‘Suspenseful, ruefully funny and ultimately generous... an American Chekhov whose characters even at their most ridiculous seem blessed and ennobled by a luminous human aura.’ New York Times

‘Perrotta is like an American Nick Hornby: companionable and humane, lighthearted and surprisingly touching.’ Newsweek

‘Unalloyed reading pleasure...most readers will probably end up standing at the footlights, hooting for an encore.’ New York Times

About the Author:

Tom Perrotta is the author of several works of fiction, including ‘Little Children’, ‘Joe College’ and ‘Election’. He lives outside Boston, Massachusetts.

About this edition

• Publisher: Center Point Pub
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 1602850755
• ISBN 13: 9781602850750
• Binding: Library Binding
• Number of pages: 461