ARC REVIEW: The Rules by Stacey Kade

Pub. Date: April 23rd 2013
Publisher: DisneyHyperion
Pages: 416
Readership: Young adult
Genres: sci-fi

1. Never trust anyone.
2. Remember they are always searching.
3. Don’t get involved.
4. Keep your head down.
5. Don’t fall in love.  

Five simple rules. Ariane Tucker has followed them since the night she escaped from the genetics lab where she was created, the result of combining human and extraterrestrial DNA. Ariane’s survival—and that of her adoptive father—depends on her ability to blend in among the full-blooded humans in a small Wisconsin town, to hide in plain sight at her high school from those who seek to recover their lost (and expensive) “project.”  

But when a cruel prank at school goes awry, it puts her in the path of Zane Bradshaw, the police chief’s son and someone who sees too much. Someone who really sees her. After years of trying to be invisible, Ariane finds the attention frightening—and utterly intoxicating. Suddenly, nothing is simple anymore, especially not the rules…

Well, that was intense! I wasn't quite sure what to expect from The Rules. All I knew was that I loved the cover and the concept. I don't read many alien-y novels so I thought why not!?

There were two main characters and we got to see both of their POVs; Ariane and Zane. Ariane is the alien/human hybrid in hiding from the government and Zane is just a human boy going about his life. Sort of. Ariane, though having been in the Outside as she calls it for years, is still very much like a fish out of water. She follows the Rules to a T but when the school bully, Rachel, starts targeting her best friend, she takes offense and slowly begins to break the rules and once there's a crack in them, it was so easy for the rest to shatter. Zane is, on the outside, a hot guy in the in crowd. But he is so much more than that. He has problems at home, harbours a great disdain for all the things his little group of friends does. I enjoyed seeing both his and Ariane's journey throughout the novel. They were both characters I was rooting for from the very beginning.

Like I said, the plot was intense. It was such a page turner I had a hard time putting it down every night so I could go to sleep and not be a member of the walking dead in the morning. There was always something going on from Ariane and Zane scheming, to GTX drama, to Rachel drama, to legitimate action scenes. It was fantastic.

In a genre saturated with fantasy and dystopian novels, it was nice to see that there was a great science-fiction book coming out that hit all the right notes. I'm so excited to see where the series goes. The ending was such an open ended thing that there are so many possibilities and I'm chomping at the bit to see where it goes.

★★★★★ 

I LOVED IT 

PURCHASE 

(amazon hardcover) (amazon kindle) (the book depository)