Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

About faintingviolet

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A reader and caffeine addict who consumes all sorts of books, some just more frequently than others. Your CBR Book Club Maven with over a decade of Cannonballing experience I believe in the beauty that comes from a common goal of reading, reviewing, and discussing. Also, Fuck Cancer. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: faintingviolet's Quick Questions interview.)

faintingviolet's Reviews:

“Directness often disguised as much as it revealed, and was a marvelous defense.”

What I Did for a Duke by Julie Anne Long

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Towards the end of June Nart reviewed What I Did for a Duke by Julie Ann Long and I had an immediate urge to drop what I was doing and go find my nook so I could start a re-read. I don’t do a ton of re-reading but there was something about this story that has kept an urge to visit it again simmering in my brain. I had visceral memories of the way the characters spoke to each other being delicious, and the house […]

Cognitive Wisdom Teeth

The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality by Amanda Montell

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I have a solid track record with Amanda Montell books. I rated her first two books, Wordslut and Cultish four stars and I talked about them a lot in my non-online life. To the point that my coworker who listens to Montell’s podcast, Sounds Like a Cult, convinced my other coworkers to pre-order her third book for my birthday this year (and get me to start listening to the podcast).   I wasn’t sure what to expect with The Age of Magical Overthinking even with […]

Mystery at Sea

Ghost Ship: The Mysterious True Story of the Mary Celeste and Her Missing Crew by Brian Hicks

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The legend of the Mary Celeste, ghost ship of the Atlantic, has sort of always been in my periphery, coming from an ocean-going family. It is at its core a terrible mystery that escaped containment and became a legend that was pulled apart and put back together again from its inception and lasted over a hundred years to the point that its story became almost unrecognizable, even shifting the ship’s name in the retellings.   The Mary Celeste had the sort of history that would lead some […]

“No one could possess a shred of doubt that Olalla’s most famous institution was the sanitarium up on the heights.”

Starvation Heights: A True Story of Murder and Malice in the Woods of the Pacific Northwest by Gregg Olson

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I added Starvation Heights to my list of books to read back in 2017 but it wasn’t until my current run of true crime reads that it made its way in front of my eyeballs. Part of me, a not insignificant part of me, wishes that I had picked this book up seven years ago and read it then, I think I might have enjoyed it more if I had. Or if I had not read it immediately following The League of Lady Poisoners.   The […]

An Illustrated True Crime Book for Grown-ups

The League of Lady Poisoners: Illustrated True Stories of Dangerous Women by Lisa Perrin

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I came to this book via the podcast Criminalia. I started listening to the podcast last year and spent about 3 months blasting through all available episodes whenever I was in a car. The hosts, Holly Frey and Maria Trimarchi did their entire first season on lady poisoners, and they had Lisa Perrin on for an interview to highlight her book of the same topic when it published last year (of which they also wrote the introduction). I had loved the interview and been intrigued […]

“Without affection for ourselves, without softness on the inside, without being kind to ourselves, we will always be tired.”

The Lazy Genius Way: Embrace What Matters, Ditch What Doesn't, and Get Stuff Done by Kendra Adachi

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My coworker and direct supervisor who is also a friend saw that I was spiraling a bit this past year and decided to get me The Lazy Genius Way by Kendra Adachi for Christmas. Between work and personal life things all hitting the fan in what felt like a non-stop no-time-for-breathing pattern I was losing it a little. She had read it and it spoke to her and she had begun implementing pieces of it into her personal and professional ethos and while she and […]



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