Pete Hautman’s middle grade novel Slider (2017) follows the story of David Miller, a middle child who has an older sister with perfectionist tendencies and a younger brother with autism. As David works to pursue his competitive eating aspirations and repay an accidental charge on his mother’s credit card, the narrative explores The Importance of a Family Support System, The Consequences of Lying by Omission, and the complexities of Navigating Morally Ambiguous Scenarios.

Pete Hautman’s work is primarily geared toward young adults, but he has also published several middle grade novels. Because he naturally gravitates toward more mature readers, he also allows his middle grade narratives to focus on mature topics such as dysfunctional families and the challenges associated with specific disabilities.

This guide refers to the first paperback edition, which was published by Candlewick Press in 2018.

Content Warning: The source material contains an instance of racism and derogatory references to people with disabilities, and both instances are referenced in this study guide.

Plot Summary

Fourteen-year-old David Miller often feels forgotten in his family. As the middle child, he has an older sister, Bridgette, who is focused on perfectionism, and his younger brother, Mal, has autism. David has an interest in competitive speed-eating. One night, while browsing the internet, he stumbles upon an auction for half of a hot dog leftover from last year’s Nathan’s Famous contest—the one that his favorite competitive eater, Jooky Garafalo, lost by. The hot dog is only $.50, so David uses his mom’s card information without permission, thinking that he will pay her back. He enters a bidding war with another user. Mom calls David to do the dishes, so he sets up an auto-bid feature to max out at $20.

After doing the dishes, David and Mom tend to Mal, who has a meltdown when he runs out of chips. They roll Mal up in a carpet for “burrito time”; this method helps to calm him. Mom tasks David with supervising Mal. David has been watching Mal for years, and he has put great effort into understanding how Mal thinks. Mal is nonverbal, with the exception of the word okay, which he imbues with different meanings depending on the context.

When David returns to the computer, he finds that he is the top bidder at $2,000 and realizes that he made a mistake with the decimal. He waits to be outbid, but the other bidder is gone. He wins the Jooky dog. David relists the hot dog, hoping that someone will buy it. He doesn’t know what to do about the $2,000 charge on Mom’s card, so in the meantime, he plans to keep his mistake a secret for as long as possible.

Bridgette’s boyfriend Derek, who knows about David’s interest in competitive eating, tells David about a slider-eating contest that pays $200 to the winner. David agrees to enter and practices speed-eating sliders. He faces steep competition but manages to win the contest. He finds out afterward that the reward is a gift card for more sliders.

David’s auction gets no bids. While still hiding the charge, he floats the idea of getting a summer job, but Mom refuses because she relies on David to watch Mal. David runs errands in town and discovers a pizza-eating contest that pays $5,000. He must first win a qualifier to enter the main contest, so he decides to enter and begins to train by speed-eating pizzas and timing himself. He learns new techniques, like dipping the crust in water. When he tells Mom about it, she’s against the idea.

David’s Jooky dog comes in the mail, and the letter of authenticity that accompanies it is suspiciously worded. He shows his friends, who also note the suspicious bidding that ended right at David’s max bid. They also notice dried mustard on the mummified hot dog.

David enters the pizza contest and scopes out his competition, which includes a famous professional eater, an older man named Egon Belt. Egon is David’s biggest competition. He begins taking his training more seriously with stomach-stretching exercises, and his parents become worried about his interest in competitive eating. They don’t want David to compete, but he needs them to sign a waiver so that he can enter the contest. David’s parents ask him to watch Mal full-time for six weeks while Mom works a summer camp job away from home, and David feels cornered. He agrees, and in return, David’s parents sign the waiver.

While practicing, David gets a pizza crust stuck in his throat and worries that he has injured himself. His auction ends with no bids, and he feels like his family’s biggest disappointment. He worries about what will happen when the Visa bill arrives. David’s friends identify the person who sold him the Jooky dog as The Gurge, a competitive eater who is famous for cheating and lying. They also point out that there would never be mustard on a hot dog in an eating contest. David is certain that he can get his money back if he can get Jooky to clarify the letter of authenticity, but Jooky is hard to track down. The Visa bill arrives on the day before the qualifier, and David hides it. His throat has healed, and he is ready to compete.

David ties Egon Belt in the qualifier, and his responsibilities of watching his brother start the next day. David and Mal go for a walk, which requires the right clothing and equipment for Mal. They are almost home when Mal has a meltdown, which David must handle alone and without the rug. David realizes that Mal’s headphones have stopped playing his song, so he sings to Mal and manages to calm him. Dad is proud of David for his quick thinking. David offers Mal sunglasses, which make the walks more enjoyable for Mal, and his brother suddenly looks around and up instead of down. David also decodes Mal’s food preferences and helps Mal to discover new foods for his limited list of safe foods. They begin walking to the pizza restaurant every day, where David practices his eating, and Mal eats plain crusts. Mal enjoys watching David eat and understands that this interest is important to David.

Mom will return on the day before the pizza contest finals. The whole family pitches in to welcome her home with a clean house and nice dinner. Everything is great until Mom checks her email and discovers the Visa charge. David confesses everything and explains what happened with the auction. David’s parents have lost all trust in him, so they ban him from the contest. David loses his temper and accuses them of not paying attention to him. He feels like a second thought and claims that their punishment is unfair because he is participating in the contest in order to pay them back and has never made a mistake like this before. He is interrupted by Mal having a violent meltdown. He injures both Dad and David before they manage to roll him up in the rug. They do not address David’s mistake that night.

David, unable to sleep, recalls when Dad crossed a picket line to save another business from a large loss. Dad told him that it is sometimes permissible to do the wrong thing for the right reasons. David uses this advice to sneak out the following morning and go to the pizza-eating contest.

David finds out that The Gurge is competing in the contest as well, and he worries he won’t be able to beat the unscrupulous competitor. He’s angry that The Gurge probably scammed him with the Jooky dog, but he doesn’t say anything. David and Egon Belt sit on either side of The Gurge. The Gurge uses ipecac, which induces vomiting, to poison Egon Belt and eliminate him during the contest, but when he drops the bottle, David grabs it before anyone notices. He’s catching up to The Gurge, but suddenly, The Gurge punches David in the stomach under the table, so David empties the ipecac onto The Gurge’s pizza and eliminates him without anyone noticing. David is in second place when he hears Mal cheering his name. His parents have brought Mal to cheer him on. Mal has learned two new words: Go and David. David wins the competition by eating 50 slices in 10 minutes. He returns the empty ipecac bottle to a miserable Gurge after the contest.

David’s parents apologize for the fact that he gets less attention than his brother. David’s parents assure him that they love him and are proud of him, but they stress that he is still in trouble.

David’s friends help him to get in touch with Jooky Garafalo, who confirms that the hot dog David bought is fake. David calls The Gurge’s mother and gets The Gurge in trouble. He receives a refund for $2,000 in the mail. David wants to give the pizza prize money to Egon Belt, but Egon refuses. Egon thinks that David earned it and says that David did the right thing by using The Gurge’s ipecac to eliminate him and make the contest more honest.

As David starts high school, he feels better about his role in his family and is more optimistic about his future. His friends have started dating, and so has he. He accepts that Mal will always be Mal, and that the family will always be focused on learning about Mal and growing with him.