"How They Croaked" by Georgia Bragg and Kevin O'Malley

184 pages

Here are the stories of nineteen well-known politicians, public figures, scientists, and other famous people--but not the tales that we usually hear about them. These are the facts about how they died rather than how they lived. From George Washington being "treated" by doctors draining more than 80 ounces of blood from his body to Beethoven having his stomach drained by a pipe screwed in from the outside, some of these famous people took some bizarre exits from this world.

I enjoyed "How They Croaked," but not as much as I thought I would. The writing at a lower level than I expected from a young adult book, and some of the deaths were interesting but some didn't seem exceptionally noteworthy to me. However, I did learn some cool things, and I liked the extra information at the end of each entry. It was like a short appendix with supplementary information about the historical person's situation. I think this is a good book to recommend for reluctant tween/teen readers, especially boys. Each entry is pretty short so they can read small parts at a time, and the subject matter will appeal to lots of kids that age.