Travel Team by: Mike Lupica Reviewed by: Stephen

Do you want to know how it feels to NOT make your 7th grade travel team?  If you do, then Travel Team by Mike Lupica is the book for you.  This book starts out in Middletown, New York, home to the main character, Danny Walker.  Danny, age 12, is the shortest kid in his grade, and has something to prove.  It doesn’t matter what your height is to be good at basketball.  Not making his travel team, Danny is looking for a way to play basketball.  This is where Richie Walker comes into the picture.  “ I am thinking about putting together a travel team,” Richie Walker is found saying to his son Danny.  This was definitely not the first option on Danny’s list.  They started out the season 0-9 desperate for a win.  They get their 1st win when Danny starts to coach his team because of Richie Walker’s drinking problem. Ty Ross, the best player on the other Middletown travel team The Vikings, helps coach the win.  He always had a bond with Danny.  That bond will play a big part in the rest of the book.     This book had a lot of interesting strengths and weaknesses. The strengths are there were a lot of describing words, the author used a lot of show not tell, and he used some excellent verbs like, Richie spun around suddenly, and stared straight at Bren and Will, as if training a searchlight on them.  They both froze, Will with his mouth open.  The weaknesses, on the other hand, were very little.  The biggest weakness was that the author used too many pronouns, which was a little confusing.      Danny Walker didn’t pick up a basketball for a whole week, Friday to Friday, a personal best.     Or worst. What I liked about this passage is that Mr. Lupica gave the reader a brief sentence on how Danny was feeling and then followed it up with a statement that basically took the whole sentence before it away.     Travel Team by Mike Lupica would be good for ages 10+.  If you are interested in controversies or sports, you should read this book.

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