Jacob Hunt is an 18 – year old boy with Asperger’s Syndrome. He lives with his mother and brother in a small town. His family don’t have friends because people don’t understand his condition. He is honest and diligent about following rules and gets very upset when people break them. He is gifted intellectually but his social skills are very poor. He is obsessive by nature and one of his obsessions is forensic analysis. He is being tutored by Jess, a social skills tutor, to help him to develop socially. When Jess is killed, Jacob is arrested for her murder. All of the evidence points to Jacob but he insists that he didn’t harm her. His mother wants to believe him but because he has been aggressive in the past, she is unsure of his innocence.
I found the storyline intriguing from the start. The interaction between the characters is very realistic and I found myself compelled to find out what happened next. I was however a bit disappointed with the ending. She left the ending up to your imagination. Overall I would highly recommend reading House Rules. I enjoy reading Jodi Picoult’s novels, she has an amazing flair for the English language.
About the Author
Jodi Picoult, 48, lives in Hanover, New Hampshire with her husband Tim and their three children. She is the bestselling author of twenty-three novels: Songs of the Humpback Whale (1992), Harvesting the Heart (1994), Picture Perfect (1995), Mercy (1996), The Pact (1998), Keeping Faith (1999), Plain Truth (2000), Salem Falls (2001), Perfect Match (2002), Second Glance (2003), My Sister’s Keeper (2004), Vanishing Acts (2005), The Tenth Circle (2006), Nineteen Minutes (2007), Change of Heart (2008), Handle With Care (2009), House Rules (2010), and Sing You Home (2011), Lone Wolf (2012) and the YA novel Between The Lines (2012) co-written with her daughter Samantha van Leer, and The Storyteller (2013). Her last eight novels have debuted at number one on the New York Times bestseller list. Her highly anticipated new novel, Leaving Time, was released in the US, Canada, and Australia October 14, 2014; it will be released in the UK on 4th November.
She wrote five issues of the Wonder Woman comic book series for DC Comics. Her books are translated into thirty- four languages in thirty-five countries. Four – The Pact, Plain Truth, The Tenth Circle, and Salem Falls – have been made into television movies. My Sister’s Keeper was a big-screen released from New Line Cinema, with Nick Cassavetes directing and Cameron Diaz starring, which is now available in DVD. She received an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Dartmouth College in 2010 and another from the University of New Haven in 2012.
Jodi is part of the Writer’s Council for the National Writing Project, which recognizes the universality of writing as a communicative tool and helps teachers enhance student writing. She is a spokesperson for Positive Tracks/Children’s Hospital at Dartmouth, which supports youth-led charity fundraising through athletics; and is on the advisory committee of the New Hampshire Coalition Against the Death Penalty.
