Middle Grade Sidekick Short Review: The Trouble with Heroes (2025) by Kate Messner

cover image of The Trouble with Heroes by Kate Messner, published by Bloomsbury Children's Books, 2025.

The Basics

Page Length: 368

Audiobook Length: ~4 hours

Grade Reading Level: 4+

Target Audience Age: 9-14

Common Sense Media Score: 10+

Goodreads Score: 4.55 out of 5

Buy it HERE

Setting: Contemporary Upstate New York (in the Adirondack High Peaks region)

Genre: Middle Grade Realistic Fiction (mixed media novel - part is written in prose and part is written in verse)

Topics: Coming of age, Adventure, Mountain climbing, Adirondack 46ers, Baking, Grief, Identity, Dogs, Nature

Plot: Finn Connelly has never been a hero—not like his dad. His father, who recently passed away, was a brave firefighter and star athlete, famous for saving a woman during the 9/11 attacks. Compared to that, Finn thinks of himself as the opposite: a baker--not an athlete--failing seventh grade, afraid, angry. When his anger lands him in the newspaper for vandalizing a graveyard, he’s really in trouble.

In order to pass seventh grade, Finn has to write 36 poems, make up a TON of missed PE credits, and make reparations to the family of the woman whose headstone he destroyed. That includes hiking all 46 peaks of the Adirondack Mountains—in ONE summer. Oh, and he has to bring the woman's dog along with him, while adult hiking “babysitters” escort him on every climb.

As Finn makes his way through the peaks, nature (and surprisingly, the dog and the babysitters) begin to heal him. He finds the courage to face feelings he’s buried deep, deep down. Along the way, he discovers new hobbies, embraces his passions, and learns that heroes aren’t always what their pictures in the newspaper make them seem to be.

Themes: The definition of a "hero", Grief and Loss, Healing power of nature, Taking responsibility for your actions, Making amends and reparations

You might like this book if you like:

• Hiking, rock climbing, camping, or trail running

• Poetry

• Baking cookies

• Books like Hatchet, The Wild Robot, Hazel Bly and the Deep Blue Sea, The Light in the Lake

• Shows like Planet Earth, Life Below Zero, Wild Kratts

• Movies like Bridge to Terabithia, The Call of the Wild, October Sky, The Mighty, Alpha

  
  

Other books written by this author: All the Answers, Breakout, The Seventh Wish, Capture the Flag

Content

• Language: none

• Sex/Romance: none

• Violence/Scariness: Protagonist's father saves someone during the 9/11 attack. He dies. There is mountain climbing peril and a bear attack.

• Drinking/Smoking/Drugs: The protagonist's dad and another character suffer with alcoholism. Alcoholics Anonymous is often discussed. 

Book Talk Read Aloud Section

*What is a book talk? (Watch a how to video here. Read my blog post here)

If you have the physical book, read pages 1-6.

If you don't, read the same pages in the Kindle reading sample here.