Guts, Gore, and Death: The End

Today's book review discusses the "awful ends of the awfully famous."  Walking through the aisles of my library, I was immediately drawn to the title of Georgia Bragg's How They Croaked: The Awful Ends of the Awfully Famous.  I have always liked scary books and, after reading John Green's Looking for Alaska, I became obsessed with famous people's last words.  Bragg's book takes a humorous look at the deaths of famous people from history.  Henry VIII is referred to as "Humpty Dumpty" and Edgar Allan Poe as a "disaster magnet."  Although very tongue-in-cheek in nature, Bragg's descriptions are historically accurate.  The last fifteen pages of the book include sources and further reading.  Along with the funny text, illustrator Kevin O'Malley adds his comical drawings of these famous endings.  We get a strong picture of what happened through drawings, autopsy reports, and fun facts.  Bragg's book can seem macabre to the average reader, but he/she will soon be laughing at the ridiculous and eccentric lives and deaths of famous people.

How They Croaked: The Awful Ends of the Awfully Famous
written by Georgia Bragg
illustrated by Kevin O'Malley
Scholastic Incorporated, 2012
picture book, ages 10-14
lexile measure: 950

Awards/Recognition:
Notable Children's Books: 2012

Pictured to the Left:

Kevin O'Malley's drawings of each historic person help to start the chapters on a humorous note.  For this drawing, Edgar Allan Poe's famous vices and characters are in the background, and his face shows the depression and woe for which he was well known.

Pictured Below:

One of my favorite visuals in the book is the last page where Bragg shows the unique connections between the famous people via a "family tree" graphic.  On this page, the reader can see that Henry VIII married the daughter of Christopher Columbus's benefactors and that Napoleon is connected to five different people including marrying Marie Antoinette's grandniece.  What a small and crazy world we live in, and we can see this evidence in How They Croaked.

SUGGESTIONS

READERS

This book relates to all different types of readers, but especially the reluctant junior high reader.  The mix of humor and death appeals to that age group and the funny drawings and quirky writing keeps them entertained.  As an adult, I really enjoyed the book, but I can see that it would be considered "too young" for some adults.  I especially think this book would be a fun way to introduce a biography lesson.  Teachers could show students that reading about a famous person does not have to be boring.

WEB RESOURCES
Find a Grave
A very cool website that allows visitors to search cemeteries to see the graves of famous people.  When you search a person's name you are linked to a website with information about his/her life and death as well as pictures of the grave site.

Famous Last Words
This link is to a YouTube video of John Green.  In the video, Green gives the famous last words of 50 different people.

Book Trailer
The book trailer link is a video on YouTube that gives a good introduction to the blood and gore you will find in Bragg's text.

ACTIVITY

This book would be perfect for Halloween time!  I think a good activity would start with students picking a famous historical person from Bragg's book.  Then split up the book for them to read or read it together, etc. - whatever works best for your classroom.  After they have read the section on their person, have them create a tombstone for him/her and an epitaph.  Epitaphs are a fun way to commemorate a person's death.  Here is a link to a lesson on writing epitaphs from Read Write Think.  It needs minor adaptations to fit this assignment.  Epitaph Lesson  After they have created the tombstones, hang them up around your room to share!

SIMILAR READING

I chose the books below because they fit into the same "death" genre as How They Croaked; they are all deal with death through scary stories, burial, and bones.  I tried to find different age levels for different reading groups.

Bury the Dead: Tombs, Corpses, Mummies, Skeletons, & Rituals by Christopher Sloan
Age Range: 5th Grade to 8th Grade
This book examines the burial practices from ancient times to present day.

Ask the Bones: Scary Stories from Around the World by Arielle North Olson and Howard Schwartz
Age Range: 3rd Grade to 6th Grade
This is a collection of scary folktales from countries around the world.

The Book of the Dead by John Mitchinson and John Lloyd
Age Range: Adult

This book is an adult version of the book I reviewed.  It gives sixty-eight biographies but provides information "their official biographers would have unquestionably left out."

Looking for Alaska by John Green
Age Range: 9th Grade and Up

Although not nonfiction, this book has such authentic emotion and heart that it feels real.  John Green paints the picture of Miles and Alaska: students at a boarding school who seek the "Great Perhaps" together. 

William Carlos Williams: A Poet's Visual Biography

Today I am reviewing a uniquely-stylized biography of the famous poet William Carlos Williams.  I'm not one for a traditional biography, so this creation by author Jen Bryant caught my eye on my library's nonfiction shelf.  Much like William Carlos Williams's poetry, this biography paints a picture with words, but illustrator Melissa Sweet adds her stunning artistry to the book as well.  Revealing Williams's unique background of being a town doctor, A River of Words shows his amazing love for poetry.  Bryant writes a simple story of Williams's life while Sweet's illustrations allow the reader to see the unique juxtaposition of a doctor being a poet - writing poems on calendars, scripts, and wherever else he can during his busy day.  For the more linear reader, the end of the picture book includes a timeline of William Carlos Williams's life alongside his poems and historical events.  The combination of Bryant's words and Sweet's pictures creates a fun and informative reading experience for both children and adults.

A River of Words: the story of William Carlos Williams
written by Jen Bryant
illustrated by Melissa Sweet
Eerdman's Books for Young Readers, 2008
picture book, ages 8 to adult
lexile measure: 820

Awards/Recognition:
Caldecott Honor Book 2009
Junior Library Guild Selection
School Library Journal Best Books 2008
New York Times Book Review Best Illustrated Children's Book of 2008

While studying medicine at the university, Williams Carlos Williams meets and interacts with artists Ezra Pound, Hilda Doolittle, and Charles Demuth.  These friendships helped to shape his poetic life.

Melissa Sweet's illustrations show the development of Williams's poetry through random writings wherever he can find space and time.  As a poet, Williams didn't like being forced into structure and rhyme, and Sweet's visuals support the tone Williams achieved in his poems.

SUGGESTIONS

READERS

One of the greatest draws to this book is that it is shorter and includes more pictures than a typical biography and so, in turn, will connect to a different type of reader.  Struggling readers would enjoy the good but simple story, and the pictures will hold their attention.  Full of great, factual information in an easy-to-digest story, A River of Words is great for all types and ages of readers.  Although the picture book may seem too simplistic for a classroom resource, "For further reading" at the end of the book will help students easily find additional sources.

WEB RESOURCES
Jen Bryant
A place to find discussion guides, see reviews, order books, and find additional books by Jen Bryant.

Melissa Sweet
The illustrator's website gives greater insight into the artistry behind A River of Words.

Poetry Foundation
This link provides information about William Carlos Williams from the Poetry Foundation.  It includes his poems, article by him and about him, audio/podcasts and more.

ACTIVITY

This book would work great with a "found poetry" lesson.  William Carlos Williams's poetry lends well to the freeform style of found poetry.  First, read the book together with the class and study the structure of his poems.  To capture the feeling of Williams's poetry, give your students a magazine or a few pages from different magazines.  They don't need an entire magazine for this activity.  The less choice they have the better!  They will then look at the words on the pages, cut out the ones they like, and then glue them together on a page to make a unique poem.  Encourage them to be creative!  You could give them everyday items like where Williams would have written his own poems.  Then have the students present their "found poetry" to the class.

Here is an example of found poetry created with magazine cutouts.

SIMILAR READING
I chose the books below because they fit into the same biography genre as the William Carlos Williams book; they are all visual representations of the subject's life.  I also tried to find different age levels for different reading groups.

How I Learned Geography by Uri Shulevitz
Age Range: Kindergarten to 3rd Grade

This book is written in a similar structure to Bryant's book with great visuals and amazing information about a boy growing up in a foreign country after fleeing Poland in 1939.  The author Uri Shulevitz writes from his own childhood memories of World War II.

A Splash of Red by Jen Bryant
Age Range: Kindergarten to 3rd Grade

Another book written by Jen Bryant, A Splash of Red illustrates the life of Horace Pippin, an artist shot during World War I who has to overcome the loss of movement in his arm in order to continue painting. 

Epileptic by David B.
Age Range: High School/Adult

A more adult version than the other suggestions, this graphic novel gives us the autobiography of one of Europe's greatest comic artists, David B., and his life growing up with an epileptic brother.