Rookie

Gr 8 Up—At Podium Sports Academy, a school for top teen athletes, Aaron Wong wants more than anything to keep his position on the hockey team. He shows up the team's captain, Ramsey, in practice. Mad that a rookie could best him, Ramsey starts giving Aaron a hard time. Things go from bad to worse when Ramsey and his friends start threatening to beat him up. Aaron doesn't want to be a snitch, but he begins to fear for his life. Can he find the courage to tell somebody? The secondary characters are a little one-dimensional, but they don't detract from Aaron's difficult situation. In Vegas Tryout, Carrie loves being on the synchronized swim team, but she's worried that her weight might get in the way of her dreams. When her coach announces in front of the whole team that she needs to lose 10 pounds, Carrie is humiliated. The coach gives her an eating plan to lose the weight in three months, but she wants to lose it in three weeks. Then she'll have the perfect shape for her swim tryout. She eats less and less and passes out. The plot is simple, but hard-hitting, and it accurately depicts anorexia and how it affects teens. Both hi/lo books tackle difficult teen problems in an easy-to-read style.—Kira Moody, Whitmore Public Library, Salt Lake City, UT