Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time
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About andtheIToldYouSos

CBR11 participant
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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:

true story: my parents were called in for a meeting with the guidance counselor when I wrote a poem about bog sacrifices in third grade

Ghost Wall by Sarah Moss

February 11, 2019 by andtheIToldYouSos Leave a Comment

…which I learned about from reading Spider magazine. Ghost Wall kicks off with a young woman being led to the peaty gloom before snapping back to a modern teenager forced to reenact the Iron Age with her father and the massive chip on his shoulder. Clocking in at a mere 130 pages, Ghost Wall bridges the expanse from ancient Britons to bored college students. Sarah Moss’s prose is sparse but lush; months worth of meditations shift and shimmer through the fog of just 130 pages.   A theme reigns supreme throughout […]

Filed Under: Fiction, History, Horror, Speculative Fiction, Suspense Tagged With: abuse, Acient Britons, coming-of-age, femininity, historical reenactment, inferiority complex, iron age, pre-christian, ritual, Ritual Sacrifice, sarah moss, tradition

andtheIToldYouSos's CBR11 Review No:5 · Genres: Fiction, History, Horror, Speculative Fiction, Suspense · Tags: abuse, Acient Britons, coming-of-age, femininity, historical reenactment, inferiority complex, iron age, pre-christian, ritual, Ritual Sacrifice, sarah moss, tradition ·
· 0 Comments

eeeugh. gross in so many ways.

The Innocent by Ian McEwan

February 10, 2019 by andtheIToldYouSos 9 Comments

TRIGGER WARNING: sexual violence- and other terrible things What started out as a fairly mild story of a man who is a:not good at his job and b: not a terribly interesting person lurched suddenly downhill into a dirge of rape fantasy, sexual violence, murder, and dismemberment. “Eeeugh” was putting it lightly. I’m not one to tell you, dear reader, what to do- but I strongly suggest avoiding this garbage fire. I am normally drawn to post-war drama- especially involving espionage and intrigue- but I […]

Filed Under: Fiction, History, Suspense Tagged With: 1950s, Berlin, espionage, ian mcewan, post-war, white male privilege

andtheIToldYouSos's CBR11 Review No:4 · Genres: Fiction, History, Suspense · Tags: 1950s, Berlin, espionage, ian mcewan, post-war, white male privilege ·
Rating:
· 9 Comments

“There are new monsters now”

Universal Harvester by John Darnielle

January 20, 2019 by andtheIToldYouSos Leave a Comment

This novel sneaks up on you. You’re lulled into comfort with descriptions of old video rental places, suburban living rooms, and the polite peace of the Midwest before being startled awake by sudden glances of violence and fear. These shocks originate from movies. Movies within movies. Were they intended for you to see? Why are they here? Who spliced an almost still image of heavy breathing and a woman with a bag over her head into She’s All That? Uncertainty creeps around every corner- breeding fear, […]

Filed Under: Fiction, Horror, Suspense Tagged With: adulthood, cult worship, film, first person, grief, Iowa, John Darnielle, loss, midwest, Mountain Goats, outdated technology, resilience, Small town, spooky, third person, uncertainty, VHS

andtheIToldYouSos's CBR11 Review No:3 · Genres: Fiction, Horror, Suspense · Tags: adulthood, cult worship, film, first person, grief, Iowa, John Darnielle, loss, midwest, Mountain Goats, outdated technology, resilience, Small town, spooky, third person, uncertainty, VHS ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

an exercise in lying to liars

Transcription by Kate Atkinson

January 11, 2019 by andtheIToldYouSos Leave a Comment

What began as a slow and cold (le Carré-esque) waiting game grew into a white hot flash of deceit, anxiety, and dangerous thrills. I cannot claim to know the full horrors and trials of World War II- nor can I draw a true comparison between that dark time and the present, but the world of this book is a different world from our current version. One constant remains: the truth is subjective. In 1940 a young woman is recruited into the fold of MI5. Europe […]

Filed Under: Fiction, History, Suspense Tagged With: BBC, Britain, espionage, Fiction, Kate Atkinson, literary fiction, MI5, mid century, post-war Britain, radio, WWII

andtheIToldYouSos's CBR11 Review No:2 · Genres: Fiction, History, Suspense · Tags: BBC, Britain, espionage, Fiction, Kate Atkinson, literary fiction, MI5, mid century, post-war Britain, radio, WWII ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

you will falsely remember being told about Melmoth by your grandmother’s mother when you were very small

Melmoth by Sarah Perry

January 2, 2019 by andtheIToldYouSos 10 Comments

There is something immediately nauseating – hear me out- about this book. You can be nauseous when you feel ill, when you ride a roller coaster, when you are nervous, or when you eat too many sweets. There is a feeling of hopeful dread that climbs over you (and all of the characters within) before you have finished reading the first page. There is a feeling that you have been here – in a cafe in Prague, under an overpass in Manila, in a field […]

Filed Under: Fiction, Horror, Mystery, Suspense Tagged With: #fate, Bohemia, fakelore, folklore, literary fiction, mythology, Prague, Sarah Perry, WWII

andtheIToldYouSos's CBR11 Review No:1 · Genres: Fiction, Horror, Mystery, Suspense · Tags: #fate, Bohemia, fakelore, folklore, literary fiction, mythology, Prague, Sarah Perry, WWII ·
Rating:
· 10 Comments
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