"Evan Quick, Hero's Log, May the 25th… and darn it – I just can't do this. I'm never going to be a Mask. Get over it Evan."

Evan Quick has spent his whole life dreaming of becoming a hero. Every morning he wakes up and runs through a checklist of test to see if he's developed powers over night, and every day it is the same thing – nothing. No flying, no super strength, no heat rays or cold beams. No invulnerability – that always hurt to check – no telepathy, no magic. Not even the ability to light a light bulb without flipping a switch. And now, he's finally ready to give up.

But then, the class field trip to the Mask Museum is interrupted by a super villain attack, and Evan somehow manages to survive a death ray. Even better, Evan's favorite Mask, Captain Commanding, shows up to save them all -- and when things go very wrong, it's Evan who finds the strength to come to Captain Commanding's rescue.

Yet the hero's reception Evan is expecting never happens. Before he even gets the chance to say hello, Evan is bundled away to The Academy, an institution derisively called The School for Sidekicks by its students. Forced to take classes like Banter Basics and Combat with Dinnerware, while being assigned as an ‘apprentice' to Foxman – a Mask widely considered a has-been -- Evan starts to worry that he'll never be able to save the day. . . .

School for Sidekicks is a fun, action-packed middle grade novel by Kelly McCullough, the author of the WebMage and Fallen Blade adult fantasy series.

A Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year

“An excellent choice for any reader awaiting the next Marvel film.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review

“Disquieting revelations await a fledgling teenager at superhero school. . . . Readers will savor his triumph as well as the melodramatic plot and the cast's rib-tickling array of ‘metahumans’.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review

“There is so much to recommend about this wonderful adventure tale. . . . Evan and his friends at Hero High are pretty normal adolescents caught in extraordinary circumstances, much as a famous young wizard once was in the ‘Harry Potter’ series.” —Children's Literature

KELLY McCULLOUGH is the author of the adult fantasy series Webmage and Assassin's Blade. School for Sidekicks is his first novel for young readers. He lives in Wisconsin with his physics professor wife and a small herd of cats, all of whom he adores.