Make Good Trouble: Discover Movements That Sparked Change.

by Ashley Lukashevsky (Illustrator), Jamia Wilson, Devon Blow (Illustrator)

Overview of 70 events in which young people worked, and often succeeded, to be a force for improvements in everyone's lives. From the strikes by the Lowell Mill factory girls in the 1830s to fights against book banning in the early 2020s. Includes generous back matter.

Genres: Nonfiction

224 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2025

Reviews

[Cheryl]

Snippets. Unhelpful illustrations. For the most distracted reader, or for those wanting a sourcebook to introduce them to possibilities for more in-depth research. Not even enough, imo, to be inspiring. Still, I'm not the target audience, so I won't rate... it might be exactly what many young people want.

I did only carefully skim.
What caught my eye:

In Korea teens led the fight for independence from Japan's colonial rule in the early 1900s.

I've heard about the White Rose protesters against World War Two but there were also the Edelweiss Pirates.

The Green Feather Movement protested a book banning campaign targeting Robin Hood during the McCarthy era.

I've heard of the Birmingham Children's crusade and if I recall correctly there is a good picture book about it. There's a quote in this book from one of the participants, decades later: "People thought the kids were going to get hurt, but the reality was that we were born Black in Alabama, and we were going to get hurt if we didn't do something."

10 million people went on a Wildcat general strike in 1968 in France. However this book does not make it clear exactly why.

In the early 2000s students and others boycotted Taco Bell because they wanted the chain to support human rights for the farmers. It worked. "It was part of one of the most successful labor actions ever seen in the United States."

June 2026

[Jill]

This was a great book. I learned about a lot of movements that I'd never heard of before reading this. I liked that each movement was just a few pages long and that they were arranged by date. I also liked that it focused on movements from all over the world, not just the US. This was a very interesting read that I think everyone should check out.

[Shannon]

This was a fantastic collection of real life youth protestors across the decades that is sure to educate and inspire our youth and show them that what they do matters and small acts of resistance can effect important changes!! Great on audio and HIGHLY recommended!!

[Kim Maxwell]

Inspiring - amazing all the things that young people are able to accomplish when they come together for a collective goal

[Erin Logan]

Seventy 2-4 page snippets of real people starting revolutions! I really loved the format and ispirational feeling of this book and hope I can get my students interested in it.

[ian]

printers row lit fest find. picked it up after hearing the author speak in conversation with some of the smartest people maybe ever.

[Emma Land]

short, sweet, impactful, what more could you need??