I give House Rules four out of five stars. I actually liked this one overall more than previous Picoult books that I've read. This one lacked a big plot twist which was a nice change, and it also lacked the "neatly tied up, everyone gets a happy ending" ending that typifies Picoult novels. This one was much more realistic than most (as in, I could actually see it happening without too much eye-rolling) and still had a good story throughout.

The reason I didn't give it five stars was due to the dumb romance of Emma & Oliver and the fact that it was pretty predictable and took a little too long to wrap all up. The last two books I've read of Picoult's seemed like her editor fell down on the job. They were longer than they needed to be and could have been edited a little better. There were two parts near the end that were almost verbatim repeats of stuff she had already written previously. That was kind of lame.

Overall I would recommend this book if you like Picoult novels OR if you would just like a light, but interesting read.