Election. Tom Perrotta

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      TOM PERROTTA

      

       Election

      

Copyright

      This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

      

      Fourth Estate

      An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.

      1 London Bridge Street

      London SE1 9GF

      

       www.harpercollins.co.uk

      This Harper Perennial edition published 2009

      First published in the USA in hardback by G. P. Putnam's Sons (1998).

      First published in paperback in the USA by Berkley (1998).

      

      Copyright © Tom Perrotta 1998

      

      Tom Perrotta asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

      

      A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

      

      All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks

      

      HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication

      Source ISBN: 9780007262403

      Ebook Edition © MARCH 2009 ISBN: 9780007319411 Version: 2017-01-05

      From the reviews of Election:

      ‘Election provides those gratifyingly exact and telling portraits of the kids themselves. Solid plotting guarantees that the reader really does want to learn who wins when the ballots are finally counted’

       New York Times

      ‘A neatly written, nimble-witted novel. A good-natured, John Irvingesque portrait of the contemporary world … Seamless storytelling’

       Washington Post

       for my brother and sister

      “The teacher is engaged, not simply in the training of individuals, but in the formation of the proper social life. I believe that every teacher should recognize the dignity of his calling; that he is a social servant set apart for the maintenance of the proper social order and the securing of the right social growth.”

      —JOHN DEWEY

      “The world is the School gone mad.”

      —WILLIAM TREVOR

      Table of Contents

       Title Page

       Copyright

       Praise

       Dedication

       Epigraph

       Chapter 1

       Chapter 2

       Chapter 3

       Chapter 4

       Chapter 5

       Chapter 6

       Chapter 7

       Chapter 8

       Chapter 9

       Chapter 10

       Chapter 11

       Chapter 12

       Chapter 13

       Chapter 14

       Chapter 15

       Keep Reading

       Acknowledgements

       About the Author

       By the Same Author

       About the Publisher

       1

      MR. M.

      ALL I EVER WANTED to do was teach. I never had to struggle like other people with the question of what to do with my life. My only dream was to sit on the edge of my desk in front of a room full of curious kids and talk about the world.

      The election that turned me into a car salesman took place in the spring of 1992, when Clarence Thomas