Bibliographical information:

Stork, Francisco X. Marcelo in the Real World. New York: Scholastic, 2009.

Brief summary:

Seventeen-year-old Marcelo Sandoval, who has "an autism-like condition" that resembles but isn't precisely Asperger's syndrome, is looking forward to spending his summer working in the stables at his school. His father, however, wants him to have experience in "the real world" of his law firm. He challenges Marcelo to work in the mailroom of his law firm for the summer instead, and makes his return to the school he loves contingent on successfully living according to the "real world" rules of the firm. The summer proves social and ethically challenging for him, as he struggles to negotiate human relationships and moral obligations of various kinds.

Comments:

Marcelo's experiences are interesting and thought-provoking, illuminating the networks of intersecting and sometimes conflicting obligations which human beings inhabit. Marcelo is at the high-functioning end of the autism spectrum, and his attempts to make sense of the work and social worlds he's navigating expose the strangeness of those worlds as much as (and sometimes more than) they expose his limitations.

Grade/Age level:

The book is marketed as a young adult novel. My twelve-year-old enjoyed it, as did her parents.

Cautions:

If you like this book, you might also like . . .

--Lisa Gordis

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