Rules

Rules by Cynthia Lord

Rules is also a recipient of the Schneider Family Book Award which honors an author or illustrator for a book that embodies an artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences.

After spending some time living in the world of narrators with ASD, we’re returning to the sibling’s perspective.  This time 12 year old Catherine struggles to manage life with her younger brother David.  She sometimes wishes that he’d wake up from his autism and be a normal brother like the kind her friends have.  Catherine is a stark contrast to the siblings portrayed in Mockingbird and Anything But Typical.  She is not perfect and understanding, although most of the time she is loving and patient; she gets mad; she yells and she wishes her brother were different.  Catherine is frustrated by how often her mother often expects her to step up and share responsibility for David and how her father doesn’t always have time for her.  And she’s frustrated because everyone only expects a little from David, but a whole lot from her.

Rules provides a great opportunity to discuss perspective and perception. At one point Catherine comments “how can his outside look so normal and his inside be so broken?  Like an apple, red perfect on the outside, but mushy brown at the first bite.”  It’s clear that Catherine sees David as damaged, less than perfect.  It would be interesting to discuss differences in people and whether these differences are inherently bad or just different.

The other main focus of Rules is Catherine’s wish for a friend.  With her friend Melissa away, Catherine’s hoping her new neighbor Kristi will fill in, but she soon finds someone unexpected is turning out to be a better friend that she ever would have suspected.  She meets Jason while waiting for her brother at the occupational therapist.  Jason’s there for speech therapy.  He communicates using picture cards and Catherine imagines how frustrating it must be for him to have such a limited vocabulary.  She decides to make him more cards so that he can communicate more, things from her own world as well as important words she can’t believe he’s missing like friend.

The ending is sort of fabulously open, but that may irritate readers looking for final answers.  I would recommend this for middle grades readers and up.

Sex, Nudity, Dating – Catherine and her friend Kristi talk about which boys are cute and if they’re allowed to date.   Kristi mentions she and her boyfriend broke up right before she moved.  One of Catherine’s friends has divorced parents and Kristi’s parents are separated.  The boys and girls in the book walk the fine line between like and like like.
Profanity – None.
Death, Violence and Gore – None.
Drugs, Alcohol and Smoking – None.
Frightening or Intense Things – None.