Product Description
Tracy Flick wants to be President of Winwood High. She's one of those ambitious girls who finds time to do it all: edit the yearbook, star in the musical, sleep with her English teacher. But another teacher, staunch idealist Jim McAllister, thinks the students deserve better. So he persuades Paul Warren-a good-hearted jock-to throw his hat into the student council's elections. But that puts Paul's sister Tammy in a snit. So she runs too, on an apathy platform-before starting a real campaign--to get herself kicked out of school.
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Amazon.com Review
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.
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 An entertaining little novel made into an even better movie ( trainreader61 )
Who can read "Election" now and not think about the movie starring Matthew Broderick (as Mr. McAllister a/k/a Mr. "M") and Reese Witherspoon (as Tracey Flick, the high school junior with the crazy ambition)? Through a rotating format of a few pages of narrative from mostly four different characters, the author weaves an absorbing tale about a do-good high school teacher who feels compelled to knock down to size an overly-ambitious student when she runs (uncontested at first) for student body president. The characters jump off the page, which is why the book basically doubled as a screen play for the movie. The movie embellished the characters and made the story simultaneously more humorous and sinister (one of my favorite scenes - the hilarious running dialogue of the difference between "morality" and "ethics" - was original to the movie).
I think "Election" is one of those very quick reads that anyone can enjoy. Tom Perrotta's characters often are more complex than meets the eye, and I think he subscribes to the philosophy that you can find good and bad in most people.
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 The blurring of lines between adulthood and adolescence ( rabidbookfiend )
Like a cross between Ridgemont High and John Hughes's Shermer High, Tom Perrotta's fictional Winwood High might serve as metaphor--a microcosm of American society: the clash of egos, the petty conflicts, the cynical view of civics. But I think that a (perhaps unintended) theme--a preoccupation, really--of "Election" is that adults, when immersed long enough in the world of teenagers, become indistinguishable from their wards. Certainly history teacher Jim McAllister allows the wall that separates him from his students to crumble. Like his disgraced colleague Jack Dexter, who has had an affair with student Tracy Flick, McAllister loses his way when he behaves like the adolescent he isn't.
The blurring of lines between adulthood and adolescence is only further muddied, unfortunately, by the similarity of the various first-person voices that populate Perrotta's story. If it weren't for the subheads helpfully telling us who's speaking at any given moment, it would be difficult to tell Mr. McAllister and his students apart; many of their accounts read like droll depositions given in a juvenile court proceeding.
When the individuality of the characters does become discernible, however, the portraits often flirt precariously with stereotype--the ambitious overachiever Tracy, the dumb jock Paul Warren, his sister the cynical slacker Tammy Warren--and the depictions of the adults who infiltrate the playground often read like unintentional farce. Even a cameo appearance by the school janitor is written through the same prism of monotone minimalism, while the school principal Walt Hendricks is little more than a watered-down re-creation of Ed Rooney, the petty tyrant of "Ferris Bueller."
Not quite realism, not quite parody, the novel does manage to capture successfully the comic parochialism of a suburban high school and the exaggerated misfortunes of youth. The plot twists keep these students and their hapless teacher somewhat interesting, and it's a fun read (and certainly not as profound as it pretends to be). Yet there's a "written for the screen" aspect to the novel that underscores the undeniable slightness of the prose and that invites comparisons to the many motion pictures from the past three decades that have handled this material with far more nuance and wit.
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Even high school students can be shady politicians!
In the novel Election Tom Perrotta demonstrates the microcosmic tendencies of high school during an election for school president. The novel centers around Mr. M, a high school current events teacher and the three students who are running for office, Tracy, Paul and his sister Tammy. Tracy is your classic overachiever who refuses to let anyone get in her way as she heads for the top. Paul Warren is the misunderstood jock, while his sister represents the more isolated student population (i.e. Goths, band members, videogame fanatics, etc...) Mr. M and the other school administrators show that teachers in fact do have lives, those full of drinking, marital problems and career disappointments. Several other characters, including the profane, perverted assistant principal and Paul's sexually adventurous girlfriend, round out the bunch of dynamic characters.
The fact that the novel is set in the early nineties, in the midst of the Clarence Thomas scandal and the rise of Bill Clinton, is a perfect background for the cutthroat election the students are partaking in. Just like real politicians, these young students are also able to tie politics to sex, mudslinging and drama, making for an entertaining read.
Staying true to his style, Election is witty, honest and relevant to the time in which it was written in. A quick, enjoyable read.
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 Disappointed ( david_cofer )
Election, by Tom Perrotta, is a relatively simple, short novel. The book is only 200 pages long, and the final chapter appears to have been written merely to satisfy the publisher's length requirement. This last chapter adds nothing to the story whatsoever.
This short novel contains a relatively simple plot and has no sub-plot. The characters appear bland and "cardboard." It is difficult to really care about any of them. The story is interesting, so I gave the book two stars, but the novel could have been so much better.
I was especially disappointed in a couple of situations in which the author relied on coincidence to wrap up the story line. It defied belief that a man could wad up two sizeable pieces of paper, throw them into a trash can and the other two men standing only a few feet away were unable to hear him wad up the papers. Then how one of the other men, looking in the trash can for the very same papers could overlook them? This was more disbelief than I could suspend. And how convenient that when the janitor empties the trash can later that evening, two pieces of paper fall out of the can, missing his trash sack. Yup, you guessed it, out of the dozens of pieces of paper and gum wrappers in the trash can, the two pieces of paper one of the men was looking for just happened to be what fell out of the trash can. I thought the author relied too much on coincidence to wrap up the plot.
Again, an interesting story, but check the book out from the library and dont spend good money on purchasing the book yourself. The story failed to live up to its potential, and could have been a much better novel.
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If You Liked Little Children, You'll Like This One Too ( chesswriter )
Like Little Children, this novel (or more accurately, novella -- Election checks in at a mere 39,000 words) is a great satire on American suburban life. While Little Children uses the culture surrounding 30-something parents of toddlers as Perrotta's focus, this books uses the milieu of high school. Both books provide the same effect -- characters wind their way into trouble through their emotional shortcomings. In this book, every character draws sympathy from the reader, even the most disturbing. (I'm thinking of the child molester in little children, and, here, the English teacher who sleeps with his 15-year-old protege -- one wonders if Perrotta reads alot of Nababkov.) Perrotta's writing is trim and fit, in the style of Raymond Carver.
This book would garner five stars except for one flaw. The book is written in the first-person singular of each of the five or six characters. This provides an interesting perspective for the reader, but Perrotta doesn't develop distinct voices for each character. At times I thought I was reading the first-person account of one character when it was really of another. I read an interview somewhere (I forget where) where Perrotta was talking about this unique feature of the book. I can't remember if Perrotta said this was a difficult thing or an easy thing to do -- whatever way, he didn't quite succeed. Often the ramblings of a 15-year-old girl blend with those of a 32-year-old man. Only the janitor of the school seemed to have a totally distinct voice.
This one flaw aside, Election is an entertaining book and a quick read. It's well worth the price and the time if you like Perrotta's other work.
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