Prolific Ontario author Eric Walters’ third contribution to the Orca Soundings series for reluctant readers, Juice balances a low reading level (Grade 2) with high interest and teen subject matter. However, there is a cost.

The main character is Michael “Moose” Monroe, the star and MVP of his championship high school football team. He’s a good kid who works hard to get average grades, helps his mother, and lives to play football. It seems wonderful when the new, cliché-spouting football coach arrives with apparently endless resources to buy equipment and bring in a strength coach. The newcomer also talks up a storm and promises the boys, in particular Moose, the world.

Of course, the catch is steroids, or “juice” in the slang. Moose begins using the drugs so he can help the team win a higher division and earn a college scholarship to help out his bank-teller single mother. He starts to notice unpleasant side effects, such as acne and mood swings, before the coach and his assistant are arrested and the old coach returns to erase the steroid-selling coach’s clichés (such as “winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing”).

Juice is an easy read and there is a helpful downloadable teacher’s guide on the Orca website. Walters’ punchy writing style keeps the story moving along, but the characters are one-dimensional, their motivations are simplistic, and the plot lacks depth. Even the main character seems detached and takes no part in resolving the conflict.

This may be the cost of getting high school jocks with poor reading skills involved, and the 25 titles in the Soundings series are certainly popular. Let’s hope that those drawn into reading by Juice will progress to Orca’s and Walters’ meatier fare.