Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

About drmllz

CBR 4
CBR 5
CBR 6
CBR 8
CBR14 Participant
CBR14 Bingo Badges
CBR15 Participant
CBR16 Participant
CBR17 Participant

I'm a literature and media studies lecturer and researcher at a university on the south coast of England (my reviews are absolutely not meant to be taken in my professional capacity nor reflect the views of my institution). I've participated in some early CBRs and then came back for CBR 14 onwards. Much like every year, I'd like to do more reading for fun, especially of contemporary fiction, and less crashing in front of Netflix. In 2021 I had a cancer diagnosis and surgery--it really helped following along with CBR reads and Facebook chat and knowing there were people out there enjoying reading books and supporting cancer research and patients even amid all the pandemic chaos.

drmllz's Reviews:

“Comedy is laughter in the face of death”

Wyrd Sisters (1988) by Terry Pratchett

Witches Abroad (1991) by Terry Pratchett

Lords and Ladies (1992) by Terry Pratchett

Carpe Jugulum (1998) by Terry Pratchett

by 2 Comments

These are re-reads, these are beloved, these are–I suggest–suitable for the fanfic square because they are riotous and revelrous games with Shakespeare plays and fairy stories and Dracula and witch traditions, even while they question the logics behind them. For example, as Pratchett points out, witches would probably not be dancing around nude during their eldritch rites because it would get quite chilly. Wyrd Sisters (1988) Autocorrect keeps trying to make wyrd into ‘word’, which is fitting, because this is a book partly about the […]

“I feel like this isn’t about me”

Yellowface (2023) by R. F. Kuang

by 1 Comment

I don’t really know what I can say about this book, which I think means it’s worked? I can say that it’s blistering, and brilliant; I can say that it fits the ‘Fiasco‘ square because it’s about someone who “reached for the stars and utterly failed…a disaster created by human actions” and in this case the disaster is a person who finds herself in a nightmare of her own making, but the disaster is also the publishing industry and the surrounding discourse, and also the […]

“Dreams, they’re for those who sleep”

The Virgin Suicides (1993) by Jeffrey Eugenides

by 3 Comments

Content note: The novel contains graphic death scenes and deals with suicide extensively. This review also discusses suicide  and death quite briefly. Bingo square: Earth day: the novel deals with pollution and decay and environmental ruin I was by way of being a movie buff for a while in the early 2000s (which is how I found Pajiba), and I watched Sofia Coppola’s 1999 adaptation of The Virgin Suicides then, and read the book afterwards. I think it was that way around–I remember being surprised […]

Follow the nursery rhyme

Keisari Seisoo Palatsissaan (The Emperor Stands in His Palace) (1971) by Eeva Tenhunen

by 4 Comments

Bingo square ‘Golden’: A famous author’s literary legacy looms large–and lucrative.  It is criminal that the work of Eeva Tenhunen (1937-2017) is out of print and untranslated. Described in her day (she published her novels between 1964 and 1987) as ‘Finland’s Agatha Christie’, you can see the influence of the English Golden Age of detective fiction: a country house and its rituals, a disruptive outsider, and a seething bubbling crucible of familial and marital tensions, class and political differences, and deep dark secrets. Tenhunen swaps […]

“From sprinkler splashes to fireplace ashes / I waited ages to see you there”

Cassandra at the Wedding (1962) by Dorothy Baker

by 1 Comment

I was going to make a few brief notes about this and then add this to my review roundup of the Monica Heisey and Curtis Sittenfeld books–and they sort of make a good triptych of more or less complicated women by women writers. But I ended up rambling a bit more about this one, and indeed, Cassandra of Cassandra at the Wedding is not so much complicated, or even messy, but a full on crucible of chaos and doubt and solipsism in human form, who […]

“And isn’t it just so pretty to think / All along there was some invisible string / Tying you to me?”

Really Good, Actually (2023) by Monica Heisey

Romantic Comedy (2023) by Curtis Sittenfeld

by Leave a Comment

Really Good, Actually (2023) by Monica Heisey I came across Monica Heisey on Caroline O’Donoghue’s podcast Sentimental Garbage, in an episode on ‘Break-Ups’, and then found out that Heisey had been a writer on Schitt’s Creek, which I love enough that I wrote an academic chapter on it and still managed to love it afterwards. Really Good, Actually, does not at all have a Schitt’s Creek vibe, which is good! We love a versatile creative type! It’s about Maggie and her post-divorce malaise at the […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo