Slider by Pete Hautman - ADVISABLE

Hautman, Pete  Slider, 275 pgs.  Candlewick Press, 2017.  $16.99 

Content: Language: G; Mature Content: PG; Violence: PG.  

MS – ADVISABLE

David enjoys following competitive eating contests, so when a half-eaten hot dog from a famous competitive eater goes up for auction online, David wants to own it.  Somehow the auction gets up to $2,000 and David wins, charging the amount to his mother’s credit card without her permission.  In an attempt to earn money to fix his problem, David starts to enter into eating contests.  While training for his eating competitions, he is usually taking care of his autistic brother Mal and trying to figure out his friends whose relationships are changing.  David has to learn to balance his life and figure out who he is becoming.  

At first this book was hard to read and boring, unless you are really into eating competitions.  But as David starts to figure himself out I cared about what happened to him and his friends and family.  I think middle school boys are your target audience with this book and they will enjoy the gross facts.  David participates in a frat party eating contest and the events there puts the mature content at PG and then David's brother, Mal, has a violent episode putting the violence at PG.

Reviewer, C. Peterson.