Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

About blauracke

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Loves books. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: blauracke's Quick Questions interview.)

blauracke's Reviews:

“That’s an excellent suggestion, Miss Triggs. Perhaps one of the men here would like to make it.”

Women & Power by Mary Beard

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What do the Odyssey‘s Penelope and Elizabeth Warren have in common? One was told to shut up, the other to sit down, and thus both were denied the right to power and leadership in the form of public speech. Based on two of her lectures concerning women’s relationship with power, Mary Beard demonstrates in this book that attitudes from the Greco-Roman world are still prevalent. This is a really short book, but there is so much thought-provoking information in it, and Beard is so succinct […]

Freedom, what does it mean?

On Anarchism by Noam Chomsky

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What comes to mind when one hears the words ‘anarchism’ or ‘anarchy’? Maybe lawlessness, survival of the fittest, or people throwing bricks through storefront windows and Molotov cocktails at the police. There is, however, the political theory of anarchism which proclaims that everyone has the right to be free, and if this freedom is curtailed, then only for legitimate reasons. That sounds like it would lead to chaos or law of the jungle, but it does not, because social anarchists believe in a highly organized […]

“If we cannot live entirely like human beings, at least let us do everything in our power not to live entirely like animals.”

Blindness by José Saramago

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When one man suddenly goes blind, no one can quite explain what happened. When it spreads to the ophthalmologist who examined him, and then to other people they both were in contact with, it becomes clear that it is a highly infectious disease. As there is neither an explanation nor any treatment available, the afflicted are locked into an abandoned mental hospital where they mostly have to fend for themselves. There are many books in which the breakdown of civilization in difficult circumstances is examined, […]

“Who will you burn?” – “Hag. Witch.”

Corrag by Susan Fletcher

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Based on true events that took place in the late 17th century, this is the story of Corrag, a young woman who had to flee England under accusations of witchcraft but finds a new home in the Scottish Highlands. Only months after her arrival, she witnesses the Massacre of Glencoe, the politically motivated murder of the leader and other members of the Clan MacDonald, presumably under order of the King of England. The story is narrated by Corrag herself who has been imprisoned for witchcraft […]

Bring Out Your Dead

A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe

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Written in 1722, this is an account of the epidemic of bubonic plague that ravaged England in 1665 and 1666, and is generally known as the Great Plague of London. One of the last major outbreaks of the disease in Europe, it led to the death of about 100,000 people in just 18 months. Although Defoe wrote this 60 years after the fact and told the story through the eyes of a fictional character, this may as well be a factual report of the events. […]

The Fallout

Chernobyl Prayer by Svetlana Alexievich

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In April 1986, a series of explosions occurred in the nuclear reactor of Chernobyl in the Ukraine. Consisting of stories told by firemen, clean-up workers, soldiers, scientists, widows, orphans, residents, and evacuees, this book is not concerned with the event itself, but the aftermath, especially in the author’s home country of Belarus which was heavily impacted by the fallout. This has to be one of the most horrifying and depressing, but at the same time impressive and touching books I have ever read. There are […]



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