Wild Life — Todd Strasser

Gr 6-8 After struggling for years (Rock ' n' Roll Nights 1982) and finally making it to the top ( Turn It Up! 1984, both Delacorte), the rock band Coming Attractions self-destructs: Oscar, the keyboardist, retreats into egomaniacal fantasies; Karl, the drummer, swings from drugs and drink to shaven-headed Buddhism; Susan, the bassist, goes to Europe to study art; and Gary, lead singer, protagonist, and all-around Good Guy (as the book opens, he takes concert tickets from a scalper and hands them to a young fan) gets back together with his old girlfriend, Allison, and embarks on a more settled career as a record producer. As before, the plot and characters contain few surprisesStrasser is careful to give everyone just what they deserve in the end, from a new job to a punch in the nose. Sex, drug abuse, and other features of the high life are kept offstage; unfortunately, so is the music. Readers of the first two books will want to read this to see how the story concludes, but they are likely to be disappointed to find it so routine and unimaginative. John Peters, New York Public Library