The Abstinence TeacherTom Perrotta
I hate to abandon books - really, I do. But when said book is so painful, so trite, so utterly shitty, there comes a point when one must admit that it simply isn't worth it.
It took me some time to realize that abandoning this sinking turd was necessary. The Abstinence Teacher comes so lauded, that for awhile I thought the problem was with me. Don't believe me? From the jacket: The New York Times Book Review calls it an "extraordinary novel...at once suspenseful, ruefully funny, and ultimately generous."
REALLY? Suspenseful? By 30 pages in, I already knew how this one would end. I flipped to the end, and sure enough, I was right. Okay, maybe I'm just psychic, and Perrotta was really able to create suspense. Sure. But funny? Generous? Not funny, not funny at all. And generous? Every single character was the biggest fucking stereotype I've ever seen.
Let's see, there's Tim, the narrow-minded Christian who crusades against Ruth, a divorced, liberal sex-ed teacher. (Can you see where this is headed?) Then there's Randall, Ruth's token gay friend. As for Ruth, ugh what a cliche. She's divorced, getting older, and so desperate for a man that sleeping nude (and alone) on Friday nights is "the erotic highlight of her week." Whatever.
I was gonna stop there, but this one is too funny: The Washington Post calls this piece of shit "A virtuoso set of overlapping character studies." HAHAHAHAHA. I suppose it's easy to overlap so many character studies when each character is flat as a board. Having read almost 100 pages of this sucker, I can say that it's 100 pages too many.
In a nutshell: Joke's on you, suckers! I got this one out of the library. I win!
Bibliolatry Scale: abandoned
It took me some time to realize that abandoning this sinking turd was necessary. The Abstinence Teacher comes so lauded, that for awhile I thought the problem was with me. Don't believe me? From the jacket: The New York Times Book Review calls it an "extraordinary novel...at once suspenseful, ruefully funny, and ultimately generous."
REALLY? Suspenseful? By 30 pages in, I already knew how this one would end. I flipped to the end, and sure enough, I was right. Okay, maybe I'm just psychic, and Perrotta was really able to create suspense. Sure. But funny? Generous? Not funny, not funny at all. And generous? Every single character was the biggest fucking stereotype I've ever seen.
Let's see, there's Tim, the narrow-minded Christian who crusades against Ruth, a divorced, liberal sex-ed teacher. (Can you see where this is headed?) Then there's Randall, Ruth's token gay friend. As for Ruth, ugh what a cliche. She's divorced, getting older, and so desperate for a man that sleeping nude (and alone) on Friday nights is "the erotic highlight of her week." Whatever.I was gonna stop there, but this one is too funny: The Washington Post calls this piece of shit "A virtuoso set of overlapping character studies." HAHAHAHAHA. I suppose it's easy to overlap so many character studies when each character is flat as a board. Having read almost 100 pages of this sucker, I can say that it's 100 pages too many.
In a nutshell: Joke's on you, suckers! I got this one out of the library. I win!
Bibliolatry Scale: abandoned
5 comments:
I laughed out loud...
Terrific review Biblio.
I 100% agree with you, although I made the mistake of finishing the stinking pile because I was convinced it would get better. It didn't.
The funny thing is that I gave this book a scathing review on my own blog a few months back, and it's like my friends absolutely refused to believe me. Makes me wonder if all the gushing critics even read it, or if they're still basking in their post-Election glows.
Anyway, it was nice to read your review. Made me feel vindicated. ;)
Well, crap. I had high hopes for this one after stumbling upon a copy at my library. Have you read any of his other stuff?
Thanks for saving me the trouble on this one.
ROFL!!!!! That was an amazing review. I've seen this book around a lot (along with its raving reviews), but I thank god my readerly interest didn't go off whenever I saw it. Now, instead of ignoring it, I'll consciously avoid it.
Thanks for the warning- I'm takign this one off my TBR list. I had heard so much about it that I assumed it would be great. Thanks for saving my time.
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