Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

About Pooja

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Ardent reader of pretty much anything, including the backs of shampoo bottles. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: Pooja's Quick Questions interview.)

Pooja's Reviews:

“Whatever that story meant, it was mine to tell.”

Adult Drama: And Other Essays by Natalie Beach

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CBR16 Bingo – Liberate: In this exploration of her early adulthood, Beach liberates herself from the petty dramas of her past – especially when it comes to closing the chapter of her toxic friendship with Caroline Calloway. Natalie Beach might have shot to viral fame with her confession to being the ex-best friend and ghost-writer for an infamous influencer, but in this book she takes us on a tour of various other facets of her coming of age, from working in a pencil store to living […]

“You, and only you, are ultimately responsible for who you become and how happy you are” – allegedly, at least.

Girl, Wash your Face by Rachel Hollis

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To reach a happier and more fulfilling life, Rachel Hollis advises you must unlearn the lies you’ve been telling yourself and push yourself beyond whatever limits you assume are there. I am not at all a self-help book reader, though I have plenty of friends who enjoy consume this genre in books and podcasts and social media posts. To each their own, I suppose. But listening to true crime podcasts while walking my dog made me start wondering if we’d ever run across a body […]

Screw Your Courage to the Sticking-Place

Monster Movie! by Chuck Wendig

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Ethan is afraid of everything, so when his best friends Olivia and Harvey insist on him joining in on a screening of a mysterious film considered to be the scariest movie ever made, he refuses outright. However, when the movie turns out to be a monster bent on destroying the town, Ethan must brave his fears if he is to save everyone and everything he loves. There’s a difficult balance to reach with middle grade horror, which I hadn’t thought much before I started reading […]

The Heart Trumps the Head

Never Wager with a Wallflower by Virginia Heath

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Venus and Galahad have never really gotten along, but when he buys the buildings next to the orphanage she works at intending to turn them into a gambling hall, their sparring begins to look a lot more like attraction and respect. This is the third book in the Merriwell Sisters, which follows a trio of sisters who must make their own way in the world after being abandoned by their ne’er-do-well father. I haven’t read the first two books, but this worked well as a […]

Janet Just Won’t Quit

The Kadin by Bernice Small

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This book charts the colorful life of Janet Leslie from birth to death. Born in Scotland, she ended up one of the chief wives of an Ottoman prince and comes to play an important part in his reign. Firstly, this is not a romance. We do not see much of the relationship between Janet/Cyra and either of her love interests. Instead, we get a lot of political intrigue, historical facts, and some lovable gal palling between Cyra and Selim’s other wives. It’s not serious historical […]

Suspension of Disbelief on Steroids

I Will Find You by Harlan Coben

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David is serving a life sentence for the brutal murder of his young son five years ago, but he is adamant that he did not commit the crime. When his former sister-in-law Rachel visits with what may be a photograph of his son – still alive – he becomes determined to break out of prison and figure out the truth. This is my second Harlan Coben book, and while they are very different from each other I was suprised to see a small link – […]



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