Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time
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About GentleRain

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Your jack of all trades eccentric. Knows a little about a lot and a lot about a little. Tends to mainly read non-fiction (history, true crime, old gossip, etc), SF/F, horror, graphic novels, "genre" books. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: GentleRain's Quick Questions interview.)

GentleRain's Reviews:

“My mother had little sense of childhood, and simply saw it as an inconvenient life stage to be got through as quickly as possible.”

Diamonds at the Lost and Found by Sarah Aspinall

November 20, 2022 by GentleRain Leave a Comment

I bought a lot of memoirs on my vacation this summer and realized when I got home how many are about fraught mother-daughter relationships. I guess I’m working through something, or else I just like reading about dramatic psychological family structures. Either way, Diamonds at the Lost and Found fits in the template of the troubled mother and the put-upon daughter who’s dragged in her wake. This book takes a nested narrative format, where Aspinall simultaneously tells the story of her childhood and adolescence being […]

Filed Under: Biography/Memoir Tagged With: #memoir, Britain, mother daughter relationships, Sarah Aspinall, travel

GentleRain's CBR14 Review No:132 · Genres: Biography/Memoir · Tags: #memoir, Britain, mother daughter relationships, Sarah Aspinall, travel ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Give PKD a Pass and Read Some Octavia Butler, Save Yourself!!

We Can Remember It For You Wholesale by Philip K. Dick

November 19, 2022 by GentleRain Leave a Comment

Honestly a disappointing and often infuriating read. We Can Remember It For You Wholesale is Volume Five of Philip K Dick’s collected short stories, covering 25 stories from the mid-60s to early 80s, and is also the title of the most famous story in the collection. I had read this before maybe seven years ago and have been carrying it around since. As part of my effort to weed out my fiction shelves, I figured I would re-read it and see if it was a […]

Filed Under: Science Fiction, Short Stories Tagged With: #Science Fiction, 70s sci-fi, classic sci-fi, Philip K. Dick, short story collection

GentleRain's CBR14 Review No:131 · Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories · Tags: #Science Fiction, 70s sci-fi, classic sci-fi, Philip K. Dick, short story collection ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

“It was time for something new:” Cozy Fantasy During a Chilly Fall is the Best

Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree

November 16, 2022 by GentleRain 5 Comments

I unfortunately can’t remember whose review on here stuck in my mind and got me to buy this book this weekend, but thank you once again to the Cannonball community for their great recommendations! I was wandering around the Strand and this was a random add-on to my pile based off the hazy recollection that this was well reviewed. This book was a nice treat after reading a bunch of 70s sci-fi that had me questioning if I even actually like genre fiction. Fortunately cozy […]

Filed Under: Fiction Tagged With: #fantasy, cozy fantasy, delightful, giant cat, like a warm hug, Travis Baldree

GentleRain's CBR14 Review No:130 · Genres: Fiction · Tags: #fantasy, cozy fantasy, delightful, giant cat, like a warm hug, Travis Baldree ·
Rating:
· 5 Comments

“Everyone’s oil sands are different, and these were mine:” A Masterful Graphic Memoir

Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton

November 13, 2022 by GentleRain 2 Comments

I’ve been waiting several years to read this as Kate Beaton has been working on it and I’m super happy to say that this was well worth the wait. Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands is a graphic memoir that covers two years that Beaton spent working in the Albertan oil sands. I got Maclean’s for a long time (back when it was weekly!) so I have a good base knowledge about the oil sands and their attendant environmental and social problems. Her nuanced […]

Filed Under: Biography/Memoir, Graphic Novels/Comic Books Tagged With: Canada, canlit, graphic memoir, kate beaton, oil sands, rape culture, Sexual Assault

GentleRain's CBR14 Review No:129 · Genres: Biography/Memoir, Graphic Novels/Comic Books · Tags: Canada, canlit, graphic memoir, kate beaton, oil sands, rape culture, Sexual Assault ·
Rating:
· 2 Comments

“Now, turn down the lights, flip the page, take my hand, and start the dance…”

Turn Down the Lights by Edited by Richard Chizmar

November 12, 2022 by GentleRain Leave a Comment

I continue my efforts to read through the books that have been sitting on my shelves for years. Turn Down the Lights is a collection of short horror and thriller/suspense/crime stories from the long-running magazine Cemetery Dance. Chizmar started the magazine in college and also runs a small press that publishes a variety of genre novels. I got this due to the fact that Stephen King and Chizmar have a long-standing relationship, and the first story in this collection is by King. Then it sat […]

Filed Under: Fiction Tagged With: Edited by Richard Chizmar, horror, short story collection, suspense/thriller

GentleRain's CBR14 Review No:128 · Genres: Fiction · Tags: Edited by Richard Chizmar, horror, short story collection, suspense/thriller ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

“I made faces like the faces on the rocks, and I twisted myself about like the dead ones, and I lay down flat on the ground like the twisted ones.”

The Twisted Ones by T. Kingfisher

November 9, 2022 by GentleRain Leave a Comment

I gave T. Kingfisher’s horror oeuvre another shot and I’ve come to the conclusion that I like her romance/fantasy writing more, so I’ll give another one of those a try if I want to read anything else by her. This one follows Melissa, who goes by Mouse, as she heads down to North Carolina to clean out her grandmother’s house. She’s just had a bad breakup and needs to get out of Pittsburgh for a while, so when her dad asks her to take on […]

Filed Under: Fiction, Horror Tagged With: body horror, folk horror, folk magic, horror, t kingfisher

GentleRain's CBR14 Review No:127 · Genres: Fiction, Horror · Tags: body horror, folk horror, folk magic, horror, t kingfisher ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments
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