Tom Perrotta, author of Election, Joe College, The Abstinence Teacher and Little Children, has written a new book called The Leftovers. It’s about a Rapture-type event and sounds really interesting. I’m adding it to my reading list. Perrotta and his novel were featured in a NY Times article this past Tuesday, and I found the following quote really insightful and true:

“You know, you just watch people leave the world, and you get this sense of living among absences. So I think it was a kind of midlife book. There I was reading about the Rapture, and I started to think, I know that feeling. I know that feeling of being left behind. We’re always being left behind, we’re always living in a world where there are these spaces where people we knew and loved used to be.”

I finally saw it.  I loved it.  Perhaps more to come later on this film.  Until then, here’s a related article by A.O. Scott in yesterday’s NY Times Magazine titled Neo-Neo Realism. The article focuses on a handful of American directors, including Kelly Reichardt, making films in the neo-realist tradition. I was really excited to see this article because I love many of these films. I was also reminded that I really want to see Treeless Mountain. Wendy and Lucy, and now this article, have gotten me thinking and inspired to start on the project that has been germinating in my brain for awhile now. I must start writing.