THE, MARIAH DELANY LENDING LIBRARY DISASTER

Not a materialist"" but simply someone whose juices flow when she's into a money-making enterprise, Mariah delights her literary parents with a new-found interest in books. Then they discover that Mariah is not reading their books but lending them out in the hopes of collecting overdue fines, and she in turn discovers that many of the volumes her classmates are delinquent about returning are rare, valuable editions. Greenwald builds a few laughs into the situation's development, but her happy ending--Mariah (1) inspires all the evasive borrowers to return the books, (2) becomes suddenly responsible about her schoolwork, (3) finally gets hooked on reading by sampling Great Expectations, and (4) becomes an ardent fan of the public library-relegates this to the fairy tale collection.