THE KID IN THE RED JACKET

A boy learns to adapt to his new environment in this realistic story. Howard, 10, is miserable when his family moves from Arizona to Massachusetts in the middle of the school year. His first days in a new school are as bad as he expects—and, worse, the 7-year-old next door, Molly, decides Howard is her new best friend. After some trial and error, Howard extricates himself from Molly's enthusiasm, and makes some friends his own age. The tone of this first-person narrative is rather unpleasant—Howard's complaints and self-pity get stale long before he stops feeling sorry for himself. The plot seems to be constructed simply as a story about moving, and the writing is undistinguished. There are some strong flashes of humor, however, especially in the interchanges between Howard and Molly. The story's voice usually sounds like that of a real 10-year-old; it might serve to remind a reader in the throes of change that things do get better.