Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

About Ellesfena

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I mostly read nonfiction (especially public health-related), mysteries, and fantasy. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: Ellesfena's Quick Questions interview.)

Ellesfena's Reviews:

Intriguing, but Confusing

The Last Murder at the End of the World by Stuart Turton

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The story: A small group of villagers on an island are the last survivors on Earth after a deadly fog wiped out most of humanity. The residents of the village include regular villagers as well as three “elders,” who are scientists that work to keep the fog at bay thanks to a complex security system and lead the island. One morning the villagers awake to discover that one of the scientists has been murdered, and this murder has triggered a change in the security system. […]

What can I say that hasn’t already been said?

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

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The Story: the narrator (Richard, although his name is used so rarely that I kept forgetting what it was) leaves an unhappy existence in California to attend the small, private Hampden College in Vermont. There, he decides to study Greek under an enigmatic professor, Julian, alongside a small, elitist group of other Classics students: cold and intellectual Henry, anxious hypochondriac Francis, twins Charles and Camilla (I wish I could find descriptors for these other than “twin,” but unfortunately they’re both very thinly drawn), and Bunny, […]

Marketed as a thriller, but it really isn’t

Don't Forget the Girl by Rebecca McKanna

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The story: In the early aughts, Abby, Bree, and Chelsea were best friends and students at the University of Iowa. On Halloween night, they get in a fight, Abby runs off, and is never seen again. Her suspected killer is later arrested and convicted of another murder, but Abby’s death is never officially solved. Twelve years later, Bree and Chelsea have drifted apart but are brought back together as Abby’s suspected killer is soon to face the death penalty for his other crimes. The story […]

“Was it possible that the best bit of him was shining forth, and surfacing?”

Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

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The book: Bill Furlong owns a company that delivers coal to the residents of a small town in Ireland in the 1980s. Furlong (as he’s mostly referred to in the book) is married, has 5 daughters, and had an unusual upbringing (an unmarried mother, he was raised by her and her employer and doesn’t know his father–not an easy childhood in mid-century Ireland). One day, when he’s delivering coal to the local convent, Bill finds something that disturbs him and forces him to make a […]

“Terror and delight sitting next to each other, their feet dangling off the side of a bridge very high up.”

The Book of Delights by Ross Gay

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The book: A few weeks before his 42nd birthday, Ross Gay decided to try to write a daily essay on delight, starting on his birthday and ending one year later, when he turned 43. Although he ended up not writing every single day, there are about 100 short essays in here, some only a paragraph, some several pages. They cover all kinds of thing that delight Gay, things you might think of, like hummingbirds or flowers, and sometimes things you really, really might not think […]

While you make pretty speeches, I’m being cut to shreds

Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention, and How to Think Deeply Again by Johann Hari

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Bingo: Minds I’m conflicted about this book. Stolen Focus is, as the title says, about all the ways in which the modern world destroys our attention spans, and what we can do to help ourselves. Each chapter is about a different cause of shortened attention, and potential solutions (some individual, some global). For most of the book, I was really enjoying it. Sure, a lot of the information was stuff I already knew, but with a lot more detail and nuance than I’d read before. Johann Hard […]



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