A Blind Guide to Normal

Gr 4–6—Richie Ryder Randolf is used to being a big fish in a small pond. At the Addison School for the Blind, he's hilarious, he's smooth, and he's popular enough to serve as a social mentor for others. Relocated to a middle school in suburban Washington, DC, for eighth grade while his scientist parents go on assignment, he's flopping on the shore and gasping for air. Between navigating the challenges of his limited vision (he wears an artificial eye owing to complications from cancer) and being a social disaster, Ryder is seriously struggling—and he's not the only one. His grandfather, who's supposed to be taking care of Ryder while the boy's parents are away, talks to his decades-dead wife, lives as if he's still in the 1970s, and insists on calling the protagonist by his full name, Richie Ryder. Ryder's parents are immersed in work to the point of benign neglect. In this sequel to A Blind Guide to Stinkville, Vrabel injects just the right goofy mix of hormones and pain into Ryder's mounting rages, fervent emotional deflection techniques, and confusing romantic ups and downs and gives equal weight to the foibles and dramas of those around him. As any reader of middle grade fiction might expect, the title is a red herring—nobody's normal, and everybody's just trying their best.