How They Croaked By Georgia Bragg
How They Croaked is a nonfiction book about “the awful ends of the awfully famous.” In other words, the book is about how many historical figures met their demise. The book is organized by each historical figure and gives a brief summary of their lives before explaining their death. Each chapter explains in gruesome detail how each historical figure passed and what happened right after each historical figure’s death. The figures range from Albert Einstein to Julius Caesar to Beethoven to George Washington to Pocahontas. Many of these articles challenge many myths about these historical figures. Each article has roughly 4 pages of summary of the historical figure’s life. After that, the article includes a paragraph about his death or so and half a page about what happened to him after his death. There are exceptions to this rule because of an excess of information. For example, A lot happened involving Albert Einstein after his death. Also, James A. Garfield had a boring life but an excruciating and long road to death after being shot. After the chapter, there is usually a few facts about interesting points in the chapter.
There are many interesting chapters, but one of my personal favorites is the chapter about James A. Garfield, the 20th president of the USA.This article includes information about how Garfield was shot and then died afterward. When Garfield was president, the president was not protected, the secret service was created to protect money. Also since a schedule was posted in the paper, a man knew where Garfield was going to be and shot him. Since many advanced medical technologies were not there when Garfield was president, doctors could not find the bullet. Many doctors stuck their unwashed fingers into the bullet wound and quickly infected the wound. After less than 3 months of using various technologies to find the bullet, Garfield died of blood poisoning, the infected wound, and a heart attack. After the chapter, the book would explain how Robert Todd Lincoln was near 3 of the assassinations of presidents, the secret service evolved over time and what medical advances were too late for Garfield.
Overall I like this book very much because it is fun to read. Many nonfiction books are boring to read which is one reason that many kids do not like to read nonfiction that much. This is a very engaging book, but it is a little disgusting so I would recommend it for ages older than 10 years old. I vastly enjoyed the connections diagram at the end which showed how all these historical figures connected with each other. There are many facts in the book which are engaging. The book includes a lot about how the medical practice was different throughout history. So, as a result, I would probably give this book 4.5 stars because it is very interesting but, it is gory.