The Changed History Series #2: Fantastic Fugitives by Brianna DuMont

Wow! Think of a buddy telling you stories about famous people who rebelled against society resulting in important historical changes. Some of the changes were news to me. Some of the people might have done terrible things, say John Dillinger and Typhoid Mary, while others clearly were not, like Nelson Mandela and Harriet Tubman. Reading non-fiction is not something I usually enjoy, but reading about all these legendary fugitives was fun and informational. I didn't really know how Martin Luther hugely changed the Catholic religion in the early 1500's, or how Koxinga's armies in the 1600's started a dispute between China and Taiwan that's still going on today. The FBI was formed because of Dillinger's criminal activity, new disease control was needed after Mary's cooking spread typhoid around New York City.

The author writes about these important people in history using a VERY casual and amusing style. Cleopatra marrying her little brother was "super gross considering he was ten years old", and the author called him "pip-squeak Ptolemy". The whole marrying one's relatives thing was compared to "a bad reality show". Typhoid Mary's poor choices caused people to "diarrhea themselves to death", and Virginia Hall "made Rambo look like Bambi." After sharing their stories, the author summarized how the culture or society was changed forever because of them. Pictures and side stories in the margins were an added bonus. "Fantastic Fugitives" offers an entertaining way to learn history! I would have enjoyed history classes more if DuMont had written my books!