Eleven year old Perry T. Cook has lived all of his life at the Blue River Co-ed Correctional Facility in Surprise, Nebraska—in other words, in prison. His mom is the one who committed a crime, however. She lives on Cell Block C. And Warden Daugherty, Perry’s foster mom, is the one who makes it possible for Perry to live in prison with his birth mom, sort of. The warden and the guards and the prisoners and Perry and his mom are all just fine with Perry living at Blue River, but when the new District Attorney gets a bee in his bonnet about the inappropriateness of Perry’s living situation, Perry’s life is turned upside down.
OK, the premise is a little improbable, but it does shine a light on the issue of children whose parent(s) are incarcerated. And All Rise is not just an issue-driven novel; it’s a good story about an extremely patient and compliant boy (Perry) who finally, through persistence and a little luck, manages to get the adults to look at the spirit rather than the letter of the law. Gary Schmidt calls the book “a deeply moving, even inspiring novel”, and the plot and characters remind me of Mr. Schmidt’s books. An innocent boy is caught up in the problems of the adults around him and finds a way to navigate those problems with kindness and perseverance.
There are a couple of problems with the book. First, Perry is a little too innocent and patient, never complaining even when his new foster father is manifestly blind and unfair. But the point of the story is that Perry has been trained to be compliant in his life growing up in a prison, just as incarcerated criminals are trained to be compliant and not necessarily to think for themselves or stand up for their own convictions. There are also a few instances of cursing (God’s name taken in vain) that may add to verisimilitude of a prison setting, but don’t add much to a middle grade novel. However, those instances were only a handful.
I found Perry’s story inspiring and moving myself, and it has a lot to say about the work of forgiveness and about rehabilitation and even our justice system and our foster care system. Children need and long for their own parents; when they are unable to be with their parents because a parent is in jail or prison, the child is serving a sentence along with the parent. And that’s sad. All Rise for the Honorable Perry T. Cook is a hopeful story, however, and one that might help children to understand some things about prisoners and the justice system and children in foster care jut a little bit better.