House Rules 2

I started "House Rules" by Jodi Picoult a while ago and over time I have been most interested in how the main character's little brother "Theo" has developed throughout the story. Theo is the little brother of Jacob. Jacob has Aspergers disease and it makes Theo's life really difficult. But until the middle of the story Theo was really able to hold himself together, more or less. Then when his brother is arrested for murder Theo kind of loses it and runs away. You hear parts of the story from Theo's perspective so you see how he feels while things are happening to his family. I pitied Theo more and more throughout the story. There was a scene I just read where Theo goes to meet his birth father and breaks down and starts crying and explains how he wanted to show his dad that he was the man of the house who was holding everything together but he was just so stressed out and tired and upset that he cracked.

I think that when things go wrong in this family the one who can't get rid of the guilt or the pain is Theo because Jacob doesn't mind what other people think because he doesn't interpret their social ques as being harsh or mean. Theo on the other hand does notice these kinds of ques and is hurt by them. Before Jacob was wanted for murder Theo was just a mostly normal teenage boy on the outside. From what I heard it seemed like Theo tried pretty hard to keep Jacob out of his life and it sounded like he had been successful. When the trial started Theo had to leave his high school and be home schooled instead, he had to be the one to go shopping, he had to take money out from the bank account. He had to do everything that needed to be done outside of the house because Jacob was under strict house arrest and his mother needed to stay with him 24/7 in order to keep him out of jail. I think that this made Theo grow up very fast because it was putting a lot of responsibility on his shoulders and I don't think he was ready for it.

Theo started off as teenager with a life that was harder than most and has developed into the man of the house who has everything on his shoulders. The change happened quite suddenly and I don't think that he is ready for it. But he doesn't have much of a choice. He is now the only person in his family who can get things done since his brother is disabled, his mother is always busy with his brother, and his dad left when he was really little. I can only hope that as the book goes on Theo's back doesn't break with the weight of so much responsibility all piled up on him.

Izzy Blog Review

When I was looking for one to respond to I noticed that Izzy's Blog Post had been on the same book that I was reading. Izzy's post was on "House Rules" by Jodi Picoult having just started that book I agree with the points that she made. 

I felt really bad for the mother of Jacob and Theo because of everything that she was put through. It must be really hard to raise a kid with aspergers and on top of that have to raise another child as well. She was under appreciated and all she did was for her children. Part of the story was from her perspective and you could see that she had ambitions that she was never able to live out because of her kids. another thing that I saw that Izzy didn't mention was this scene about the mother not thinking about herself. It is the scene where the police officer comes to their house to ask them about the murder of Jess. The mother, Emma ends up talking to the officer and he comments on how much Jacob knows about forensics, Emma says "Tell me something I don't know." then the officer says "You have really pretty eyes."  I thought that this really highlights how the mother doesn't even think of herself anymore. 

I felt much worse for Theo than I did for Jacob or the mother because he was at a tough point in his life and he was fully aware of what people thought of him and his brother. I agree that Jacob ruined a lot of things for Theo and that he never lived up to the big brother expectations that Theo had for him. 

Also, Jacob is really smart and has an interesting perspective but I didn't really connect with him the same way that I felt bad for Emma and Theo. The only time that I really got caught up in the parts of Jacob's narration is when he began to talk about Jess. I thought it was so sad that he was in love with Jess, or at least assumed that he was, because Jess would never really feel the same. I was surprised that Izzy didn't mention this in her blog because it was a big part of the story, maybe she just hadn't reached that point of the book yet. It is a really interesting part of the book and I think that as a reader it was interesting and really gets you to pity Jacob.