Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

About elderberrywine

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Elder LOTR/Holmes fan girl/writer since forever.

elderberrywine's Reviews:

Shoutout to All You Sally Rand Stans Out There

The Case of the Fan-Dancer's Horse by Erle Stanley Gardner

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Oh it’s been a hot minute since I did a Perry Mason.  Here’s #29, dated 1947.  Diligently reading in order here, at least 50 more to go.  And this was a fun one! OK, a little background here, a fan dancer (Sally Rand being the most famous) could often be considered a classy dancer.  Ostrich plume fans always moving, and you might catch a peek here and there, but no more than that.  They were a burlesque act, but some made it to the big […]

May Want To Avoid If You Are Insect-phobic. But Otherwise, Yes!

Weyward by Emilia Hart

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Three generations of Weyward women, about a hundred years apart, and each with a peculiar gift of working with potions and spells, and having a close connection with birds and insects.  Sort of a slightly more sinister Cinderella.  The birdies aren’t the cute ones, and there is a distinct lack of adorable little mammals.  The potions are mostly for women’s health issues, abortion in particular.  Lord knows their customers are in desperate need of some help. Of course this leads to them finding themselves frequently […]

AI is nothing new. Check out this major weirdness.

The Singularity by Dino Buzzati

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This is a quirky little book, sci-fi in its way, written by the Italian author Buzzati in 1960.   The plot is an odd one, these days, but due to my background, I know where he’s coming from. Professor Ismani is summoned by the Department of Defense to accept, along with his wife Elisa, a top secret two year assignment in the Swiss Alps.  They are given no information other than it is not a military assignment, but agree to it anyway.  It is a secretive […]

Coastal Florida Gothic? Say What Now?

Banyan Moon by Thao Thai

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This is the story of three generations of Vietnamese-American mothers.  The first, Minh, was a canny businesswoman who escaped from Vietnam shortly after the fall of Saigon, with her devoted husband, daughter, and son, and a significant amount of gold sewn into her children’s clothing.  (She had owned a very lucrative jewelry business – good choice.)  Upon making their way to Florida, they purchased Banyan House, a Gothic manor house complete with the aforementioned massive tree out front. It was here her daughter, Huong, grew […]

Hardboiled.

Infamous by Ace Atkins

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The true although fictionalized account of the story of Machine Gun Kelly (the OG one) and his wife/stage manager, Kathryn Kelly, which reads like the best of hard-bitten film noir.  Want snappy dialogue?  Ya got it. “An exciting life for a farmer,” Mrs. Quigley said, raising her eyebrows.” “You can bet on it, sister,” Kathryn said, turning for the door.  “See you in the funny papers.” The FBI was a new thing, and this was a test.  Gus T. Jones had been assigned to crack […]

Palace Intrigue of the Highest Levels

The Kingdom of Copper by S. A. Chakraborty

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Here we are in the second of the Daevabad Trilogy, and unlike many another trilogy, the second volume does not disappoint (nor the third, spoiler alert).  Nahri, former street rat healer, and her companion, Dara, otherwise known as the scourge of Qui-zi for the murderous campaign he was forced to commit, have made it to the hidden djinn stronghold of Daevabad, supposedly the site where the various djinn people live in harmony.  Except they don’t. Daevabad was once ruled by the Nahid, a tribe of […]



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