Book Review: How They Choked: Failures, Flops, and Flaws of the Awfully Famous by Georgia Bragg

Alexandra Adlawan’s

Book Title & Alexandra's Review

How They Choked: Failures, Flops, and Flaws of the Awfully Famous by Georgia Bragg

5^thGrade and Up

Warning: Nobodys Perfect: Get Used to It.

Everyone makes mistakes. Sometimes epic failures even lead to super successes. And sometimes they become deep, dark secrets.

But to fail is human; to laugh about it is an easy way to learn about the past. From Montezuma IIs mistaking an enemy conqueror for a god to Amelia Earharts winging it until she crashed, this book knocks fourteen famous achievers off their pedestals to reveal the human side of history.

This book includes the mistakes and immoral acts made by famous people during their life and just like in How They Croaked, nothing is sugarcoated.

Each of these 14 famous people failed in different ways and some mistakes were worse than others. For example, Susan B. Anthonys only mistake was not living long enough to see all her work pay off while J. Bruce Ismay, who commissioned the unsinkable marvel of the sea, the Titanic, jumped the line of women and children to escape death on a lifeboat.A majority of the people featured in this book were immoral inhuman beings who only cared about themselves and whose mistakes hurt everyone around them. Theres a difference between making a mistake and being a narcissistic psychopath.

This book reminded me of the song History is Made by Stupid People. This song is about how history is made by stupid people and that clever people wouldnt even try. So, if you want a place in the history books then do something dumb before you die. A link to a YouTube video of the song is included for your viewing pleasure:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgun4yFSsuU

Im also including a video of this song being sung by the actors of the All American Melodrama because I think it was a mistake to close down their theater. This statement has nothing to do with the book, its just an entertaining video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlAeL4DEWRo&list=PLLhJBpZ0p1OCSm8hNvt-WB3Rr9DqosI4s&index=31

In conclusion, this book proves that there are many ways to fail. So, if you do make a mistake, just try not to hurt anyone.