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As Greg enters a new school year, his brother Rodrick teases him over and over and over and over again. Will Greg manage to get along with him? Or will a secret...ruin everything?
Tagline

Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules is the 2nd book in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series that was released on February 1, 2008. The title was revealed on June 12, 2007[1]. The cover depicts Rodrick Heffley shoving Greg Heffley to the ground while smiling menacingly.

Main Characters

See minor characters.

Synopsis

Whatever you do, don't ask Greg Heffley how he spent his summer vacation, because he definitely doesn't want to talk about it.

As Greg enters the new school year, he's eager to put the past three months behind him....and one event in particular.

Unfortunately for Greg, his older brother, Rodrick, knows all about the 'incident' Greg wants to keep under wraps, but secrets have a way of getting out...especially when a diary is involved.

Plot

September

Rodrick syas Sissy!

Rodrick, punching Greg rather aggressively, calling him a sissy.

Greg begins his new journal by giving a brief overview of his summer, mentioning his time on a swim team and a shared embarrassing secret with his older brother, Rodrick. As the school year commences, Greg finds himself puzzled when his classmates start avoiding him. He soon realizes that he still holds the dreaded "Cheese Touch" from the previous year, which he had acquired during the last week of school but had forgotten about during the summer break. Unfortunately, the touch is now back, and when he accidentally touches a classmate named Jeremy Pindle, he unwittingly passes it on to him.

During the summer, Greg's best friend, Rowley Jefferson, had traveled to South America, and upon his return, Greg isn't too thrilled with some of Rowley's behavior. Additionally, Greg shares an amusing anecdote about having a pen pal in French class.

Greg also writes about his mother's efforts to encourage bonding between him and Rodrick. However, their attempts don't work out as planned, and Greg feels that Rodrick can treat him however he wants, knowing the embarrassing secret from the summer. Fueled by this, Greg decides to uncover some dirt on Rodrick, but his plans take an unexpected turn when his mom introduces the concept of "Mom Bucks." The catch is that each mom Buck is worth just one penny, which poses a challenge for Greg and Rodrick to cash them in for actual money.

Meanwhile, his dad works on a diorama of the Civil War, telling Manny and Rowley that the furnace room is off-limits. Rowley starts telling Greg of his trip but leaves after Greg starts talking about his life. Susan like to rent romantic comedy films and make Frank watch them with her. Frank tries to sneak out to work on his replica by putting a pillow under his side of the bed, but he is caught by Susan and forced to go to bed early with Manny, who is scared of the "monster" in the furnace room. Following that, Frank decides to take Greg to the mall every Saturday to escape hearing any of Loded Diper's practices and seeing Bill Walter. Returning home, Frank manages to get rid of teenagers crowding his driveway much to his wife's dismay. Greg then changes focus to Manny and how he broke one of his video game consoles. Manny tries to apologize by giving him a ball of tinfoil with toothpicks to make up for Greg's loss, but Greg tries to throw it away, Susan stops him by pointing out Manny made that for him. Greg states that he got his first pen pal letter from Mamadou Montpierre but decides to write in English instead of French.

He also states that Rowley ended up sitting on Manny's 'gift', and he throws it away. Meanwhile, Rodrick is forced to type his own paper by Susan but finally gets Frank to do it for him much to his delight. Greg does his book report for a few years straight called: Sherlock Sammy Does It Again.

October

Iamahumanbeingtoo

Greg pretending that Chirag is invisible by counting every student in the room except for Chirag.

Greg notices the arrival of his old friend, Chirag Gupta, and is thrilled to see him back, but decides to play a practical joke he got from his mom, the Invisible Chirag. The whole class gets in on the joke, but Chirag manages to find their weakness: Rowley. Greg does some quick-thinking and manages to keep the joke going. Chirag reports Greg to Vice Principal Roy, but he gets the names mixed up, thinking the victim was a boy named Sharif, allowing the prank to carry on. Rowley's birthday is coming up, so Greg tells his mom to pay for a gift. Greg tells us that he would've been able to buy the gift if he had gotten money from his job this summer. He then explains their neighbors the Fuellers go away traveling each summer and leave Princess, their dog, at a kennel but they told Greg they would pay him to watch Princess. Greg accepts the job, but Princess wouldn't go to the bathroom on the lawn with him watching and after letting her back inside Princess would do her business in the house. So everyday Greg had to bring cleaning supplies with him, but when he got to the house one day, he was shocked to learn the Fuellers came home a day early. As a result of this, they didn't pay Greg a cent for what happened. Greg starts to complain he doesn't have any money so Susan creates the Mom Bucks program as a way to get cash. Rowley's birthday party takes place at the mall and aside from Greg the rest of guest were members of Rowley's karate team. They play lots of kid's party games and when it came time to play Hide and Seek, Greg decided to just hide in the ball pit until the party was over. When Greg got to the ball pit though, he discovered another boy there, but this boy was from the party from early on, he was hiding in there during hide and seek and was never found, so the staff put Rowley's party on hold until they found the boy's parents. After that Rowley had cake and opened his presents, which were mainly toys and from his parents he receives a diary, much to Greg's horror. Rowley soon starts copying Greg, so to put a stop to it Greg wraps a bandana on one pant leg and rolled up the other one. Which Rowley copied the next day and Greg wound up in the Vice Principal's office. On top of that, Chirag tells his Dad about the joke and Mr. Gupta tells Susan.

Susan takes Greg to Rowley's house, who reveals the truth in no time flat and takes Greg to Chirag to apologize. Chirag decides to forgive him and so does Greg as they reconcile their friendship. Susan, however, is mad at Greg because he lied to her, and she makes him be honest but allows him to stop after Greg proves himself. Career Day is at school and Greg notices Rowley talking about nursing with girls and decides to read his diary to see if they're talking about him, but in order to do that, he needs a key to open the diary. He cashes in half of his Mom Bucks to buy the same exact diary as Rowley's in order to get the key. Using the key, Greg opens Rowley's diary but spots nothing except for recorded Dinoblazer Action Figure battles that Rowley got on his birthday. On Saturday, Manny is taken to Gramma's house and his Mom and Dad leave for the weekend. They thought it would be a great idea to leave Greg and Rodrick home alone as Rodrick has the flu and won’t make any trouble. After their parents leave, Rodrick calls his friends and tells them he's hosting a party. Greg decides to keep his mouth shut to experience the party because he has never seen a high school party, but Rodrick traps him in the basement. The following day, Rodrick forces Greg into helping him clean up the mess. The two switch the bathroom door with a closet door as they see that someone has doodled on the original door and finish installing it right when their parents return.

Greg states that Rodrick is lucky Manny wasn't there as he is a huge snitch and remarks how he is beginning preschool; however, his class had a Halloween party, and Manny was spooked by the masks the kids were wearing, causing him to stay in the top of a closet. Greg then recalls how he thought in preschool he was going to marry ice cream due to a joke pulled by a classmate called Quinn. But his mom explains the joke and he throw it back at the kid, but not to the same effect.

November

Rodrick rules leland

Greg expects to see Heather, but instead discovers Leland at Rowley's door. TWIST!

Greg starts the month being bugged by Rodrick until Frank notices that there is no lock on the bathroom door, but doesn't connect the evidence to, Rodrick's relief. He then gets another letter from Mamadou but finds it dumb they have to write letters instead of e-mails. A few nights later, Greg heads to Rowley's house because Heather Hills is taking care of Rowley. The next night, Greg goes back to Rowley's house and meets Leland. The two friends are soon addicted to Magick and Monsters, but Susan becomes suspicious of their activities, so she observes a game. She then buys a ton of books for Greg and Rodrick to play to further their bond and improve their skills, but Rodrick destroys Greg's characters very quickly.

The school sends a letter to have parents get their students private music lessons after Music Education is canceled due to budget cuts. Susan has Rodrick give Greg and Rowley drum lessons for Mom Bucks, but it doesn't work out. At Rowley's house, Greg finds the play money Susan uses for her Mom Bucks and takes the whole stash and hides it in his bed. He tests out his new money by handing them to Susan, who accepts it without blinking and checking. Greg lies saying he'll buy a stamp for Mamadou, but after receiving a picture, he states he killed any chance of him writing back. The next day, Greg is in a hurry to write a paper for History and Rodrick tries to sell him an old paper, as he had the same assignment, but Greg refuses. However, he states that he was desperate, and he reluctantly hands him the money. However, he notices that it is of no use and flunks History.

Rodrick then tries to cash his Mom Bucks in to get money for a used motorcycle, but Susan knows she never put that big of money into circulation and ends the Mom Bucks program. During Thanksgiving, Rodrick and Greg get in a fight over who has to greet Aunt Loretta first and then dine with the family.

December

Dancing Mom

The Winter Talent Show, break a leg, kids! Well... Don't... You might in those roller skates...

Susan sends Frank to pick up photos from Thanksgiving, but he comes back with a picture from Rodrick's party. As it turns out someone at the party took a picture from the camera they keep on top of the stereo and the whole thing was caught. Rodrick tries to deny the fact that he had the party to no avail, as all the proof was in the picture. Susan and Frank severely punish Rodrick by taking away his car keys and ban him from leaving the house for a month. Because Greg knew about it and didn't say anything about it, Susan says he was Rodrick's accomplice and give him a two-week video game ban, even though Greg was locked in the basement the whole time and didn't have anything to do with the party. Knowing the brothers can't be trusted, Susan and Frank drop the two boys at the Leisure towers where Grandpa lives. Greg learns his lesson and decides to never cover for Rodrick again. Susan and Frank get Rodrick to start working on his science project himself and he manages to come up with one. The school announces a big Winter Talent Show which gets Rowley and Rodrick excited. Going crazy, Frank ends Rodrick's punishment two weeks early just so his band practices someplace else. Greg invites Rowley for a sleepover but injures him in front of Manny. Greg had put one of Frank's lifting pads and Rowley kicked it, ending up breaking his toe. Manny squeals on him and Susan makes Greg replace Scotty Douglas for Rowley's magic act. The two fail to make it into the talent show (the only act to do so) while Rodrick completes his project early to squeeze more band practices in.

Unfortunately, Rodrick's science teacher states Rodrick's project didn't use the "scientific method" with a hypothesis and a conclusion and all that. Frank tells him he'll have to miss the talent show to work on his project. Rodrick declines and says that if he and his group win, they plan on sending the performance to a big record label, and if said record label agrees to a contract with Rodrick's band, Rodrick plans on dropping out of school and doing the band full time. The Talent Show starts, and Rodrick asks Greg to film, but he declines so Susan volunteers. Löded Diper doesn't win anything and their footage is unusable because Susan talks the entire time. One of the band members remembers that the school filmed the show, but that turns out to be junk as well, as when it finally gets to their performance, the camera-operator ends up focusing on Susan when she starts dancing.

Rodrick gets mad at Susan for messing everything up and then blames Greg for this mess, and soon enough the two brothers started to yell at each other. Later, Rodrick spills Greg’s secret to his friends who have little siblings his age that go to Greg's school. Greg reveals that he accidentally walked into the women's restrooms at the Leisure Towers and got trapped (Rodrick had gotten a hold of Greg's previous diary and Greg tried to get rid of it). He then tries to beg to Susan if he can transfer to another school. Susan says that his classmates would understand that he just made an "honest mistake." Greg wishes he kept up his pen pal relationship with Mamadou because he could've gone to France as an exchange student and hide in France for a few years to wait for it to blow over. The next day, Greg is cornered by students, but they congratulate him rather than tease him. Greg realizes out that the story had got mixed and realizes that when Rodrick called his friends and told them Greg's secret, and when they told their siblings in Greg's grade about what happened, the details got totally mixed up. So, the story went from Greg accidentally walking into the women's bathroom at Leisure Towers to him infiltrating the girls' locker room at Crossland High School. Greg didn't want to set anyone straight and become very popular with the guys at school, who start calling him the "Stealthinator" someone even made him a Stealthinator headband. For Greg, the girls weren't as impressed with the story as the boys were (as one of the girls calls Greg "disgusting"), making him say it might be hard to find a date to the Valentine's Day dance.

At the end of the story, Greg explains that Rodrick sort of got his wish for his band to get noticed, because the video of Susan dancing at the talent show is now all over the internet, and Greg says that everyone now knows Rodrick as the drummer from the "Dancing Mom." Both Greg and Rodrick are being teased about it at school, but Rodrick's more embarrassed about it than Greg (who isn't actually in the video), and Greg admits that he does feel kind of bad for Rodrick. If he doesn't turn in a science project, then Rodrick will flunk out of school. Greg decides to help his brother the last time with his science project and hopes Rodrick realizes how lucky he is to have Greg as a brother.

Film Adaption

On March 25th, 2011, A film of the same name, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules (film) was released. It followed the major plot of the book, but with small changes and mild references to The Last Straw. It was met with a mixed critical response and was released for home media on July 19, 2011.

Trivia

  • The book's cover picture is replaced with Greg panicking in the woman's bathroom in the Italian and German versions.
  • This is Rodrick’s biggest appearance in a book, whom that all the other books have reduced his role. He had his second big role in Diper Överlöde, which many fans see as a sequel of Rodrick Rules.
  • It reveals in The Last Straw Rodrick did not win the Science Fair.
  • It is the same in the online version, making the project My Ferret Milky win.
  • This book covers a period of four months which is the third highest number of months ever covered in the series.
  • In this book, Manny says he is only three. However, in Diary of a Wimpy Kid, after he yells 'Bubby' at Greg on the stage, Greg says he's been able to keep that nickname quiet for five years, which was just an editing error.
  • The peculiar thing is, it that in the online version, Manny is indeed five years old, pretty much confirming that Jeff Kinney forgot to edit that part of the online book when writing this.
  • In Avengers: Age of Ultron, one of Hawkeye's kids is seen reading this book.
  • Also, in an episode of The Simpsons, there is a Diary of a Wimpy Kid book (Renamed to Diarrhea of a Wimpy Kid) At a bookshop's window.
  • This is the only book in the series that has a character's name in the title.
  • This is the first book to have someone in addition to Greg on the cover. The second book is Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever.
  • In the movie, Greg plays a role with Scotty in the talent show but, in this book, he fails to get in.
  • The glass eye trick is recycled from Igdoof strip 25.
  • In the book, Rowley is Scotty's assistant, but in the movie, Scotty is Rowley's assistant until he gets scared, and Greg has to take his place.
  • In its movie adaptation, the writing on one of the doors replaces "Hello Rodrick" with "Rodrick Rules".
  • Normally, characters are drawn with only four fingers. On page 36, in Bill’s yearbook photo, he is shown to have five fingers.
  • This is the first book where Frank is not at the back of the character page. The next books to do this are The Last Straw and Cabin Fever
  • This is the first book cover that is the color blue, along with Cabin Fever, The Getaway, and The Deep End
  • The book was originally going to be released on January 15, 2008[2].
  • On January 31, 2008, a 2-hour launch party for the book was thrown at the Wellesley Booksmith in Wellesly, MA.
  • Whenever the seventh grade is mentioned in Australian copies, it's changed to "Year 7". This is because grades are referred to years in Australia, as-well as the United Kingdom.

Goofs/Errors

  • On-Page 150, it mentions that Greg Heffley didn't have anything to turn in to Mr. Huff during the third period. However, on Page 13, Mr. Huff is described as Greg's seventh period teacher.
    • However, Greg could have gotten his schedule changed during this time period.
  • On-Page 37, a group of teenagers is shown outside Greg's house, listening to Loded Diper's music. On-Page 38, the same teenagers are shown leaving, but with different colored shoes and shirts.
  • Manny is seen too tall on page 181.
  • Manny says he's only three on page 42, however, one of the pictures from Gramma's fridge on page 161 is Manny having a birthday cake with five candles meaning he is turning five years old.
  • On page 2, Brandon, Todd, and Greg are ready to jump in. But on page 3, two fully different children jump out of Brandon's and Todd's spots. However, Greg stays the same.
  • In some revisions of the eBook version, the title page only shows: Diary of a Rodrick Rules. (Omits 'Wimpy Kid')
  • On page 192, there is a second line between an eighth note.
  • There is a line in Greg's hair that is not supposed to be there on page 193.
  • On page 22, there is a part where it says she'd make him draw a picture instead of she'd make them draw a picture.
  • In some Ebook versions, there are 2 amulet logos instead of 1.
  • Speaking of Ebooks, there was an error on page 1 where the word last has a t mixed at the start of the word.
  • On page 58, Rowley is wearing a long sleeve shirt but on the next page he's wearing a t-shirt.
  • On page 115, there is no lines on the drawing. This was fixed in a reprint.
  • On the 'More Diary of a Wimpy Kid Books' page, Rodrick is spelled as Roderick.
  • On Page 69 there is a kid with Manny's teeth and Rodrick's hair. Another kid has the head of Greg and a frown and has Rodrick's hair.
  • Whenever the seventh grade is mentioned in Australian and British copies, it's changed to "Year 7".

Reference to Dates

In the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series, the actual date of an event usually isn't given, as the series is meant to be timeless and could have happened at any time. Here are some dates that are mentioned in the book:

  • October 27 - The date seen on the bottom right-hand corner of a photo accidentally taken by Bill during Rodrick's party (March 12th in the online book).
  • October 31 - Greg mentions that Manny joins pre-school for the first time as his class was having their Halloween party.

Gallery

See Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules/Gallery

Video

Diary_of_a_Wimpy_Kid-_Rodrick_Rules_by_Jeff_Kinney

Diary of a Wimpy Kid- Rodrick Rules by Jeff Kinney

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