Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

About andtheIToldYouSos

CBR11 participant
CBR12 participant
CBR13 participant
CBR14 Participant
CBR14 Bingo Badges

Bookseller by day, book reader by night...and hopefully a reviewer somewhere in between. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: andtheIToldYouSos's Quick Questions interview.)

andtheIToldYouSos's Reviews:

what happens to the torch-bearers, the candle holders, the vigil keepers?

The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai

by 3 Comments

There is so much that I want to tell you about this book, but I won’t. I took so many notes, and placed so many scraps of paper between pages, but I do not want to ruin a single realization for you. Rebecca Makkai has crafted an intricately woven tapestry that you have to witness in its full glory; I do not want to give you a magnifying glass before you have had a chance to first witness the enormity of the project. The Great Believers hits […]

“you can play as a dog, a boot, or a trebuchet”

Nimona by Noelle Stevenson

by Leave a Comment

Man, I really wish Monopoly (oh wait- World Domination) had a trebuchet. I’m usually the shoe, but I would LOVE to be a trebuchet. It has been perpetually gray here in New Hampshire for the last…oh jeez, three weeks? I needed something familiar to hunker down with while waiting for the sun to return, and while shuffling around my house I remembered LittlePlat‘s recent Nimona review. A great review about a great book? Just the spark I needed! Thank you, LittlePlat, and thank you to […]

*record scratch* you’re probably wondering how I ended up in this situation

False Value by Ben Aaronovitch

by Leave a Comment

well, not me per say- but DC Peter Grant. There was a good deal of magic AND non-magic kerfuffle at the end of Lies Sleeping. Peter, Lesley, Chorley, and the Nightingale himself were all thrown into the process of red tape and blue lines. I read Lies Sleeping back in September of last year, and then stopped dead in the ROL-iverse except for a short story here or there. False Value was available, but no way in hell was I about to mess up my matching set […]

rain, rain, go away

Summerwater by Sarah Moss

by Leave a Comment

Is there anyone who isn’t at least slightly maddened by days and days on rain? I’ve spent many summers working outdoors under mostly temporary cover. It’s been years, but I vividly remember the feeling of perpetually wet socks and bones that felt internally chilled. In the summer of 2008, when I was working as an adventure guide at a camp in the White Mountains, it rained 29 days in June and 30 days in July. We ran out of “rainy day” activities less than a […]

take a look! it’s in *this* book!

The Library Book by Susan Orlean

by 4 Comments

Why not take a break from the world with a strangely soothing tale of a library fire? That question appears to be pure chaos, but seriously: wouldn’t it be nice to let a meticulous journalist and storyteller narrate a well-researched account of history, memory, and true crime? Good news: you can do it! Just plug your headphones in and let Susan Orlean and The Library Book transport you to a different world. Orleans covers more than just the true-crime glitter that is strewn around the  […]

crystalclear read my mind!

The Light in the Ruins by Chris Bohjalian

by Leave a Comment

Way back in the olden days of 2020, the amazing crystalclear sent some inspired picks my way for CBR Book Exchange. Hooray! I kicked off the new year with one of their thoughtful additions to my TBR pile; I had wanted to read Storm Front for some time thanks to the lovely folks here at CBR. The other book, The Light in the Ruins, was a book with which I was unfamiliar. I was immediately excited and impressed after reading the cover copy, as I […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo