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Tom Perrotta
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The Abstinence Teacherby Tom PerrottaISBN 0312363540 (0-312-36354-0)
Softcover, Griffin
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Bad Haircutby Tom PerrottaISBN 042515954X (0-425-15954-X)
Softcover, Berkley Signature
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Bad Haircut : Stories of the Seventiesby Tom PerrottaISBN 0425149420 (0-425-14942-0)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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Electionby Tom PerrottaISBN 0425167283 (0-425-16728-3)
Softcover, Berkley Signature
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Election'Book summary:Tom Perrotta is a remarkably astute observer and writer of the adolescent experience. His Bad Haircut: Stories of the Seventies is a delightful collection of coming-of-age stories, which give insight into the joys and agonies of adolescence. In Perrotta's first full-length novel The Wishbones, a 31-year-old musician can't quite cope with the responsibilities of adulthood and instead lives an extended adolescence. Perrotta's much-anticipated second novel Election again successfully ventures into the adolescent psyche.
The book is set in a New Jersey high school amidst a hotbed of political activity: students are voting for their school president. Perrotta's cast of characters are exaggerated but convincing. They convey adolescence as it often is--sometimes painful and frequently awkward. Tracy is the popular girl, smart and pretty, but she isn't quite as perfect as her classmates assume. A sordid affair with a teacher lurks in the shadows. Paul is the jovial football jock, but his parent's divorce has left him hurt and vulnerable. Then there is Paul's younger and geekier sister Tammy, the tormented underdog struggling with her sexuality. Plot develops through a series of mini-chapters, narrated by the main protagonists. There are also frequent interjections from Mr. M, the all-around good teacher every kid loves--the kind of teacher Hollywood loves to enshrine in sentimental flicks. A genuine crescendo of excitement and anticipation consumes the reader, as we eagerly await who has won the election. This is a novel of teenagers on the brink of adulthood, and is probably best appreciated by grownups with enough perspective on their own adolescent experiences to be able to take the bitter with the sweet. [via]
Joe Collegeby Tom PerrottaISBN 0312361785 (0-312-36178-5)
Softcover, Griffin
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Joe College'Book summary:Having penned Election, a great novel of high-school manners, Tom Perrotta gives us Joe College, a great novel about college mores. In 1982, one Yale junior struggles with George Eliot, dorm blanket bingo, dining-hall dish-line duty, a massive crush on a girl in love with his favorite prof, daily cards and calls from a girl back home in New Jersey, and a lush profusion of authentically individual yet instantly recognizable undergrad eccentrics. After an evening of ritualistic bong hits, kimchee feasting, and sympathetic discussion of Leon Czolgosz, the anarchist who shot President McKinley, Danny thinks of his parents: "Was this what they scrimped and sacrificed for all those years? So their son could spend his Tuesday nights drinking beer, smoking dope, eating weird food, and learning to see the assassin's side of the story?"
Yup, that's the way it was, and Perrotta's immense strength is to give moment-by-moment immediacy to his hero's tortuous internal monologue. Instead of dumping his Jersey girl, Danny figures, "if I avoided her long enough, she'd get tired of waiting and supply my half of the conversation on her own, thereby sparing me the unpleasantness of having to be the bad guy." Yet he is also capable of heroism, as when he impulsively defies no-neck Mafiosi who menace his dad's "Roach Coach" lunch truck, which Danny drives to blue-collar work sites during school breaks. What gives the story structure is the collision in our hero's soul between his former life and the world of towers, moats, and upward mobility. He can't quite identify with his hometown reverence for Bruce Springsteen, but it rubs him wrong to see Springsteen LPs played "for the enjoyment of people who were going to end up being the bosses of the people the Boss was singing about. Nobody in Entryway C was born to run."
Election may have a better plot, but Joe College scoots along like a waterskeeter on a marvelous stream of consciousness. Tom Perrotta was born to write. --Tim Appelo [via]
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LIT Riffsby Mtv, Jonathan Lethem, Tom Perrotta , Amanda Davis, Aimee Bender, Neal Pollack, Neil StraussISBN 0743470265 (0-7434-7026-5)
Softcover, Pocket Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'LIT Riffs'Book summary:Following in the footsteps of the late great Lester Bangs -- the most revered and irreverent of rock 'n' roll critics -- twenty-four celebrated writers have penned stories inspired by great songs. Just as Bangs cast new light on a Rod Stewart classic with his story "Maggie May," about a wholly unexpected connection between an impressionable young man and an aging, alcoholic hooker, the diverse, electrifying stories here use songs as a springboard for a form dubbed the lit riff.
Alongside Bangs's classic work, you'll find stories by J.T. LeRoy, who puts a recovering teenage drug abuser in a dentist's chair with nothing but the Foo Fighters's "Everlong" -- blaring through the P.A. -- to fight the pain; Jonathan Lethem, whose narrator looks back on his lost innocence just as an extramarital affair careens to an end -- this to the tune "Speeding Motorcycle" as recorded by Yo La Tengo; and Jennifer Belle, who envisions a prequel to Paul Simon's "Graceland" -- one that takes place at a children's birthday party replete with a real live kangaroo.
With original contributions from Tom Perrotta, Nelson George, Amanda Davis, Lisa Tucker, Aimee Bender, Darin Strauss, and many more -- riffing on everyone from Tom Waits and Bruce Springsteen to the White Stripes, Cat Power, and Bob Marley -- this is both an astounding collection of short stories and an extraordinary experiment in words and music.
Soundtrack available from Saturation Acres Music & Recording Co. [via]
More editions of LIT Riffs:
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Little Childrenby Tom PerrottaISBN 0312315732 (0-312-31573-2)
Softcover, Griffin
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Little Children'Book summary:TOM PERROTTA's thirtyish parents of young children are a varied and surprising bunch. There's Todd, the handsome stay-at-home dad, dubbed "The Prom King" by the moms at the playground, and his wife, Kathy, a documentary filmmaker envious of the connection Todd has forged with their toddler son. And there's Sarah, a lapsed feminist surprised to find she's become a typical wife in a traditional marriage, and her husband, Richard, who is becoming more and more involved with an internet fantasy life than with his own wife and child. [via]
More editions of Little Children:
- Little Children: ISBN 031236282X (0-312-36282-X)
Softcover, St Martins Pr - Little Children: ISBN 0312990324 (0-312-99032-4)
Softcover, St Martins Pr - Little Children: ISBN 073361907X (0-7336-1907-X)
Softcover, Hachette Livre Australia - Little Children: ISBN 0733619797 (0-7336-1979-7)
Softcover, Hachette Livre Australia - Little Children (Film Tie-in): ISBN 0733622054 (0-7336-2205-4)
Softcover, Hachette Livre Australia - Little Children: ISBN 0749082488 (0-7490-8248-8)
Softcover, Allison & Busby, Limited - Little Children: ISBN 0749083042 (0-7490-8304-2)
Softcover, Allison & Busby, Limited - Little Children: ISBN 0312315716 (0-312-31571-6)
Hardcover, St. Martin's Press - Little Children: ISBN 0312315732 (0-312-31573-2)
Softcover, Griffin
- Little Children: ISBN 031236282X (0-312-36282-X)
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The Wishbonesby Tom PerrottaISBN 0425163148 (0-425-16314-8)
Softcover, Berkley Signature
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Wishbones'Book summary:Tom Perrotta's first novel, The Wishbones, is all about that much-maligned class of 30-ish men who still live at home with their parents, guys who make furtive love to their girlfriends--if they have them at all--in the basement rec room or the back seat of a car. But Dave Raymond, the protagonist of The Wishbones, doesn't waste his time on Star Trek reruns or computer games; he spends his weekends playing in a wedding band called The Wishbones, using the rapidly receding dream of rock stardom as an excuse to put off growing up. The sudden death of a fellow musician sends Dave into something of a tailspin, however, and in a moment of weakness, he proposes to his longtime girlfriend, Julie. The engagement has hardly been announced when Dave meets Gretchen, a bridesmaid at one of the weddings at which The Wishbones play, and before long he's having serious doubts about his own marital plans.
Everybody knows someone like Dave, but a real-life puer aeternus is rarely as entertaining as Perrotta's fictional one. Perrotta wisely surrounds his sad-sack protagonist with an array of entertaining supporting characters, from a joint-smoking priest to one of Dave's band-mates whose life work is a musical based on Kennedy's assassination. By the time The Wishbones winds down to its well-deserved end, readers will be wishing for a second novel from Tom Perrotta soon. [via]
More editions of The Wishbones:
- The Wishbones: ISBN 0425169715 (0-425-16971-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated - The Wishbones: ISBN 0749386541 (0-7493-8654-1)
Softcover, Random House - The Wishbones: ISBN 0399142673 (0-399-14267-3)
Hardcover, Putnam Pub Group - The Wishbones: ISBN 0425163148 (0-425-16314-8)
Softcover, Berkley Signature
- The Wishbones: ISBN 0425169715 (0-425-16971-5)
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