The Abstinence Teacher (edit title)

• Rated 0 stars

“A very entertaining light read. ”

• Rated 3 stars

“I read a review in the Sunday NY Times book review and was excited about this book. Found it on the sale shelf at B & N. There was a reason it was on the sale shelf for 5.99. It started out with great potential, but began to drone on. The whole issue of sex ed and issues of fundamental Christianity is timely, but this just didn't get going. It felt like there was too much time spent reading about pick ups and drop offs for parental visits and not enough about the conflicting perspectives that could have propelled this novel into interesting territory. Yawn. ”

• Rated 3 stars

“I expected to like this book a lot, because sex ed and radical Christianity are two of my favorite subjects, but I mostly just thought it was anticlimactic. It built up a whole lot for kind of a nothing ending, but it was worth reading. An interesting way to while away a Sunday morning.”

• Rated 2 stars

“Just wasn't my style of book. Felt way too much like Danielle Steel”

• Rated 0 stars

“Really goodand riveting and the dialogue was fantastic but I felt let down by the ending!”

• Rated 1 stars

“I did not like this book”

• Rated 2 stars

“This book had definite potential, but seemed very forced and rushed during the last half. ”

• Rated 4 stars

“Ruth and Tim, the main characters, could have been distilled to compact clichés, but Perrotta’s mature voice and compassion for people of all shapes and sizes prevents that. Simultaneously, the storyline is a bold social commentary and an empathetic examination of the so-called “differences” that seemingly separate us. Whatever position the reader plays on the field of sexuality ed—abstinence dialogue, s/he will come away with an appreciation of how the larger debate wears away at the individual players. ”

• Rated 3 stars

“Read in 2008-2009. Ruth teaches an honest open high school sex eduction class. Tim is a member of an Evangelical Christian church and coach of Ruth's daughters soccer team. When the church forces a Christian based abstinence curriculum on the schools, Ruth struggles with the misinformation it conveys to her students. Tim struggles with his faith. Book presents both secular and religious sides without bias and lets the reader come to their own conclusions about religion and secular life. An undercurrent of sexual tension between the two characters is hinted at but the story never seems to find its way.

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• Rated 3 stars

“ This book reads like half a novel, literally. The conflict never really gets cooking and the book reaches the point where it starts to get interesting when it suddenly ends. Most frustrating is that it could have been half a great novel. It amazes me that an editor let this one get out into the world without telling Parrota that he was really onto something if he continued to explore the relationship between sex ed tacher Ruth Ramsey and born again christian Tim even further.

At the end of the novel the characters are well established and a conflict is brewing but the book never got up enough speed to have any revelations on any of the subjects it had so far tackled. ”