Audiobook Review: The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta

From the Publisher:

What if—whoosh, right now, with no explanation—a number of us simply vanished? Would some of us collapse? Would others of us go on, one foot in front of the other, as we did before the world turned upside down?

That’s what the bewildered citizens of Mapleton, who lost many of their neighbors, friends and lovers in the event known as the Sudden Departure, have to figure out. Because nothing has been the same since it happened—not marriages, not friendships, not even the relationships between parents and children.

Kevin Garvey, Mapleton’s new mayor, wants to speed up the healing process, to bring a sense of renewed hope and purpose to his traumatized community. Kevin’s own family has fallen apart in the wake of the disaster: his wife, Laurie, has left to join the Guilty Remnant, a homegrown cult whose members take a vow of silence; his son, Tom, is gone, too, dropping out of college to follow a sketchy prophet named Holy Wayne. Only Kevin’s teenaged daughter, Jill, remains, and she’s definitely not the sweet “A” student she used to be. Kevin wants to help her, but he’s distracted by his growing relationship with Nora Durst, a woman who lost her entire family on October 14th and is still reeling from the tragedy, even as she struggles to move beyond it and make a new start.

My Thoughts: 

I found the premise for The Leftovers quite interesting. What would happen if a large number of people simply disappeared? I think Tom Perrotta did a good job representing several different types of reaction people would have to such an event. Some refuse to deal with the situation, while others join a dangerous cult in hopes of making sense of things.

While the journey the characters took was interesting, I had a hard time not being somewhat angry at the end of the book. I was disappointed. Early on, I kind of figured that there would be no explanation as to the disappearance. I made peace with that. But, I did hope for a purpose in the novel. This seems to be just a group of character sketches with no real plot line to tie them together. When the story ended, I could only ask, Why?

The narrator, Dennis Boutsikaris, had a pleasant enough voice for an audiobook. I am not sure if it was the author's style or the narrator's that made the production feel a bit like listening to NPR. The whole production had a flat, overly-Prozaced tone.

I am giving this book a three out of five rating. I did enjoy some of the characters and their strange situations. However, I feel the book lacked a coherent plot. The ending seemed as if the author just got bored with his own story and decided to stop where he was at that moment. 

The Author:

Tom Perrotta is the author of five previous work of fiction: Bad Haircut, The Wishbones, Election, and the New York Times bestselling Joe College and Little Children. Election was made into the acclaimed 1999 movie directed by Alexander Payne and starring Matthew Broderick and Reese Witherspoon. Little Children was released as a movie directed by Todd Field and starring Kate Winslet and Jennifer Connelly in 2006, and for which Perrotta received Golden Globe and Academy Award nominations for best screenplay. He lives outside of Boston, Massachusetts.

Rating: 3/5

Audiobook Details:

The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta

Narrated by Dennis Boutsikaris

Macmillan Audio

Publication Date: August 30, 2011

Disclaimer:

I received a review copy of this audiobook from the publisher.