Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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:

A Lazy Book Not Recommended As An Overview of Hasidism

The Pious Ones by Joseph Berger

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After a long stretch of positive but distracting life events (a new job, a move), I find myself with enough mental room to rededicate myself to book reviews. Fortunately I have a backlog to review so I’ll jump on in with a book that deeply irritated me since I find a scathing review can be easier to write. The Pious Ones is an overview of the Hasidic community for the general reader. This is one of my main special interest areas, so I know a lot […]

A Great Daredevil Story, Unfortunately Out of Print

Daredevil by Mark Waid Omnibus #1 by Mark Waid, Paolo Rivera, Chris Samnee, Marcos Martin, Javier Rodriguez

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I love Daredevil and I really enjoyed Mark Waid’s run when it was coming out. I’d wanted to get the trade edition for a while, but the price had put me off. The value for money here is iffy for the casual reader, especially as the book is now out of print. I got a decent deal on eBay (originally retailed for $100, I got it for $119 vs the $130-150 it’s going for on Amazon), and I had wanted this for years so it was […]

“Winston was the only person Randolph truly loved.”

Churchill & Son by Josh Ireland

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If I say “this book was a lot better than I thought it was going to be,” I definitely run the risk of sounding rude, but I was very pleasantly surprised by Churchill & Son. I’m not a politics book type of person, as I tend to find them too dry, but Ireland has written a very engaging and interesting book that deals with a lot of politics in a readable and nuanced way. I was never bored or forcing myself to push through a section […]

Competent, Readable Science Fiction

Darwinia by Robert Charles Wilson

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Robert Charles Wilson writes enjoyable, twisty sc-fi and Darwinia fits into his usual pattern of work. It’s a straight forward book that I know I’ve read before, but I had no memory of any of the twists or the plot. I guess that’s part of my general sense of okayness with the book — it’s not groundbreaking or revelatory, but it is competent and fun, and not everything is going to be Ursula K LeGuin. You’ll probably like it but won’t remember it in a year. I […]

“You deserve happiness:” Thoughtful and Resonant Work from Sarah Winifred Searle

The Greatest Thing by Sarah Winifred Searle

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Another preordered gift to myself that turned out to be quite the treat! Sarah Winifred Searle is an artist whose work I’ve been following for a while and so I was very excited to see that she had a YA graphic novel coming out. The book lived up to my expectations and I really enjoyed it. The Greatest Thing is about Winifred, who’s about to start sophomore year after her two best friends left for private school. She’s afraid that she won’t make any new friends […]

“I wanted the children I taught to know that they, too, could be worthy of featuring in a novel.”

Mine for Keeps by Jean Little

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This book is a delight. Jean Little was a Canadian author who wrote over 50 children’s books, and her books often center on disabled characters. Little herself was legally blind from birth, and I think that the delicacy and realism of her novels really come through as a result of her own experiences. Mine for Keeps was her first children’s novel, which I just found out when doing research for this review, but it doesn’t seem like it’s uncertain or unpolished at all. It’s very confident […]



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