cover image Uneasy Money

Uneasy Money

Robin Brancato. Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, $11.95 (231pp) ISBN 978-0-394-86954-4

Mike Bronti thinks his troubles are over when, on his 18th birthday, he wins $2.5 million in the New Jersey lottery. With his first installment check of $94,000, he indulges himself, but Mike is too intent on amusing himself to heed his father's financial advice. In trying to prove his business acumen, he loses almost all of his first year's winnings in a real estate scam. By book's end, Mike is broke again (until the next lottery check), yet considerably wiser. Brancato (Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree, etc.) has created an interesting situation. However, characterizations tend to lack depth. The plot is a series of crises, with the hero getting into progressively worse scrapes. The story stops at its final climax and picks up a few months later, in a too tidy ending. Readers are deprived of learning exactly how Mike faced facts and resolved his problems. (12-up)