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Major Themes
Critics have noted that Rule of the Bone deals with major influences. One critic addresses Chappies abusive stepfather.“Child of a broken home, Chappie endures the sexual advances of his mother’s alcoholic boyfriend, Ken, until he reaches his breaking point and runs away.” Kim Hubbard, a recognized critic, talks about his absent father. “Rule's 14-year-old hero, Chappie, has been abandoned by his drunk of a dad.” Many different reviewers compared Rule of the Bone to the older novel “Huckleberry Finn. “Veteran novelist Banks has finally done it: He has written the Great American Novel. Or, to be more precise, he has rewritten it. Rule of the Bone is Huckleberry Finn transposed to Upstate New York in the '90s...”, “Chappie's father ran off when he was 5, and his mother married a drunken lout named Ken, who proved every bit as abusive as Pap, Huck Finn's brutal dad.” While not all comparisons are good, “"The Catcher in the Rye" and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" turn out to be completely gratuitous: in the end, they're self-conscious literary references that serve no real purpose, except to try to make "Rule of the Bone" seem like a larger and better book than it is.”, most critics agree on the use of bordering other novels made it better.

Plot
In Rule of the Bone, we meet Chappie (Bone)Dorset, a teenager in New York who lives with an abusive step-father and abused mother. Chappie is heavily into marijuana, and one day he looks for items to sell for drug money. Finding a .22 Caliber handgun and six bags of coins, He steals them. His mother cries while his step-father yells at him about stealing the coins that belonged to his mother. He leaves to meet one of his friends, Russ. The next morning after his parents go to work, Chappie goes back home to get his clothes, and the coins. Taking them, he grabs the gun and shoots his parent’s bed before he leaves.

Chappie becomes a criminal, selling drugs for a group of bikers called the Adirondacks, and shoplifting. Caught stealing from Victoria’s Secret, his parents are called by the police. They are upset, but say he can come back home. He tells his parents he needs to get his things, and he needs twenty dollars for the rent. He takes the money and says goodbye, saying that he will meet them at home. Howwever, Chappie decides not to go back home but stays with Russ until the bikers kick them out for not having any drugs. Russ decides to go back to his mom’s house for a while but Chappie refuses to go back home, staying at the mall. While there, Chappie meets a lost and sad little girl, and is about to help her when he is accosted by a security guard. After the mall cop leaves, the girl has disappeared so Chappie decides to move on. He is walking past Victoria’s Secret, when he sees the same little girl, but now with an older man who is buying pantyhose. He decides to spy on them,and watches them until they come to the food court. Chappie is hungry because he has not eaten a decent meal, so he comes up to the older man. He learns that the man’s name is Buster Brown and the little girl’s name is Froggy (a.k.a. Rose). Buster buys Chappie some pizza and they talk about Buster’s acting career. Buster tells him that Froggy is part of his career and offers him a chance at the stage. Chappie agrees but demands twenty bucks. Buster accepts his offer and they are about to leave the mall, when Chappie has a change of mind. He runs off with the money back to Video Den which he decides to call his permanent home.

Chappie and Russ go back to living with the bikers. Chappie and Russ are controlled by the bikers, depending on the bikers' mood. One day however, Bruce and the rest of his gang are partying loudly with some girls. Bone passes out after running away from The Video Den, and meets I-man, a Jamaican rastafarian who proposes to take him to Jamaica.

Bone decides to travel to Jamaica to look for his father. In Jamaica, they follow a map which leads them to a cave. After smoking marijuana with I-man, Bone passes out. Waking up, he goes to a nearby town to figure out his father’s location. Bone notices I-man selling marijuana to a man who resembles his father. He tries catching up to him, but his father’s car drives away. He asks I-man about the person he sold marijuana to, and I-man tells him that if he wants to know more, they should find a woman called Evening Star. She is a tall, muscular woman who knows his father well. They ask her for him, and just as she begins to respond, Bone's father walks into the room. Chappie tells his father that he’s his son, and they finally make a connection with each other. Evening Star and Bone’s father throw a surprise birthday party for Bone, and Bone is finally happy that things in his life are taking a turn for the better. Walking into the kitchen, he discovers I-man having sex with Evening Star. He goes to his room, and runs into his father. He asks Bone what’s wrong, so Bone tells him about I-man and Evening Star. His father says that he has no choice but to kill I-man. Fearful about his friend, he sneaks I-man out of the house before his father can get him. With nowhere to go, Bone travels back to I-man’s hometown. He helps I-man tend to his marijuana field, taking on a native look, with dreadlocks and darker skin.

After work one evening, I-man leads Bone through a twisting cave, and, giving him a special herb to smoke, causes him to pass out. Bone awakes, and is a plantation boy during the Civil-War era. He hears gunshots and screaming, barely escaping the chaos. He awakes, perfectly fine in the cave. He helps I-man and some friends pack bags of Jamaican marijuana onto a plane. For helping I-man ship his marijuana, Bone obtains a small portion of the profit. His friends all party and smoke, while Bone travels back into town. Upon returning he finds I-man and everyone else shot dead. Feeling enraged and upset, Bone sleeps in a car for the night. The next morning he goes to a phone and calls Russ, to tell him how he’s doing. Russ is amazed that Bone is in Jamaica, and tells Bone that his parents are splitting up. While talking to Russ, he finds an unknown number in his wallet. He dials it and discovers that it’s Rose’s mother. Upon asking for Rose, she(Froggy)tells Bone that Rose died a few days ago.

Alone and upset, Bone goes back to his father's home. Evening Star arrives and they walk into the kitchen to talk about I-man while she cooks dinner. She tells him that I-man was trying to rip someone off with his marijuana, which is why he and his gang were shot. Evening Star tells Bone about his father’s other family, and Bone leaves to get revenge on Jason. He finds Jason, and they duel, with the result involving Bone pushing Jason into the barbecue,and making him fall into a pool. Chappie manages to leave on a boat with a tour guide called Captain Ave. As he leaves, he glances up into the stars and looks as the constellations. The constellations morph into shapes that remind him of his friends: A barbell for Bruce, a rose for Rose, and a Lion for I-man. Chappie travels across the sea by boat, with the voice of I-man leading him on.

Reception
Rule of the Bone received mostly mixed reviews. Critics praised the plot of adventure shown throughout the novel. In one article, Ed Peaco gave praise to the novel by saying, “Like Huck Finn, Bone’s slyly unsophisticated voice explores big questions like love, sex, crime, sin, race, class, and the fate of children in a fractured society.” Critics admired Banks’ style with one quoting: “...When it inhabits the cooly wised-up consciousness of Chappie, aka “Bone”, it’s harder to get away from than a Big Issue ambush...It features a wandering street urchin whom critics have likened to Huck Finn and Holden Caulfield.”  Most praised Banks’ for his likeness to Mark Twain’s infamous tale, “Huckleberry Finn”,comparing one of the characters in Huck Finn, Jim, to I-man, a middle aged rastafarian who resembles Huck's companion. Others were not as pleased with Banks' novel. Most giving negative critique due to the Rule of the Bone's confusing plot structure and setting. In the book review from The Nation's Jess Mowry, it states: “...Unfortunately [it's] jumbled together like The Hobbit gets Kidnapped by Peter Pan on Treasure Island.”