TARANTULA SHOES

Ryan doesn't like anything about his family's move from Arizona to Kentucky, not the pink walls of his room, the humid weather, or the weird neighbor who insists on being friendly. He especially hates the fact that sixth graders attend junior high. When he hears that all the cool kids at school will be wearing $125 basketball shoes called Slam Dunk Sky Jumpers, he decides he must have a pair, and concocts several schemes to raise the money, including putting on shows with his pet tarantula. Wholly without pretensions, Birdseye (A Regular Flood of Mishap, 1994, etc.) pens a piece of lightweight middle grade fiction, as pleasant as his other books, with engaging characters (especially Ryan's younger twin siblings, who are convinced that an alien named Quando is coming to visit). If the moral is a bit predictable, it's still a good one in this amusing, modestly agreeable bit of fluff. (Fiction. 8-12)