Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time
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About TheShitWizard

CBR 8
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Drinking tea, reading books, petting cats. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: TheShitWizard's Quick Questions interview.)

TheShitWizard's Reviews:

Go wash your mouth out

Vulgar Tongues: An Alternative History of English Slang by Max Decharne

March 25, 2019 by TheShitWizard 1 Comment

As someone with a rather vulgar tongue myself, I love the ever-evolving language of slang and so this book was a delight, trawling through its history – how different terms were born, how they have evolved over time (some starting off respectable and becoming vulgar, and vice versa), how slang travels, and the different groups from which these words came. Often indeed very vulgar, derogatory, offensive and so on, slang also shows off best our creativity, imagination and wit, although obviously the perception of whether […]

Filed Under: History, Non-Fiction Tagged With: #history, language, max decharne

TheShitWizard's CBR11 Review No:8 · Genres: History, Non-Fiction · Tags: #history, language, max decharne ·
Rating:
· 1 Comment

Beware those who promise that they have the answer to everything

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

March 13, 2019 by TheShitWizard Leave a Comment

Perfect reading for cold, dark nights, Starvation Heights is a fantastic helping of true crime that reads like a thriller that will have you constantly scurrying to the kitchen for sandwiches, as well as giving a wide berth to anyone who sets themselves up as a health guru. In 1911, two wealthy British sisters – of the type that my line of work tends to call the ‘worried well’ – travelled to the United States in order to undergo the ‘fasting cure’ in the sanitarium […]

Filed Under: History, Non-Fiction Tagged With: #history, gregg olsen, health, non fiction, true crime

TheShitWizard's CBR11 Review No:7 · Genres: History, Non-Fiction · Tags: #history, gregg olsen, health, non fiction, true crime ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Decent, but a little dry

Downbelow Station (The Company Wars #1) by C.J. Cherryh

February 23, 2019 by TheShitWizard Leave a Comment

Apparently a Hugo award winner, Downbelow Station was part of the huge pile of Christmas book swag that I’ll likely be working my way through for the rest of the year. Not something I’d normally buy for myself, I found it to be an ambitious and pretty impressive piece of sci-fi world-building, but ever so slightly dry in its execution, so I didn’t quite get as into this as I would have liked. In our far distant future, the denizens of Earth have spread outwards […]

Filed Under: Fiction, Science Fiction Tagged With: c.j. cherryh, Fiction, Hugo, sci-fi, the company wars

TheShitWizard's CBR11 Review No:6 · Genres: Fiction, Science Fiction · Tags: c.j. cherryh, Fiction, Hugo, sci-fi, the company wars ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Bad books make for a good read

Bad Book Club by Robin Ince

January 30, 2019 by TheShitWizard 4 Comments

Robin Ince’s Bad Book Club is a funny and interesting tour through some of the books you will never find in Waterstones, hidden as they are inside charity and secondhand shops. Robin Ince has made a habit of collecting these books – the more esoteric or eccentric, the better – and reading them so that we don’t have to. Taking us into a world of ‘celebrity’ autobiographies (with those on the lower end of the fame scale and yet high on ego providing the more […]

Filed Under: Non-Fiction Tagged With: books about reading, comedy, Literature, robin ince

TheShitWizard's CBR11 Review No:5 · Genres: Non-Fiction · Tags: books about reading, comedy, Literature, robin ince ·
Rating:
· 4 Comments

Good, but wants more meat…

Binti by Nnedi Okorafor

January 14, 2019 by TheShitWizard Leave a Comment

Binti is a mathematical prodigy – a Harmonizer – from a tribe, the Himba, that reveres its homeland so much that they don’t really leave their land, let alone the planet. But Binti wants to attend Oomza Uni, and as said Uni as actually a planet in itself, to do so she’s going to have to bid goodbye to not just her family, but her homeland too. Which she does, sneaking out in the middle of the night. Binti soon finds herself on the ship […]

Filed Under: Fiction, Science Fiction Tagged With: #Science Fiction, Fiction, Nnedi Okorafor

TheShitWizard's CBR11 Review No:4 · Genres: Fiction, Science Fiction · Tags: #Science Fiction, Fiction, Nnedi Okorafor ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Dead good

Dead Funny by Robin Ince, Johnny Mains

January 10, 2019 by TheShitWizard 2 Comments

Dead Funny is a compilation of short horror stories written by comedians. With contributions from the likes of Richard Herring, Stewart Lee, Sarah Pascoe, Al Murray and many more, most of the authors are household names here in England, but are probably little known (if at all) State-side. That doesn’t matter though, given the talent on display. As with any bunch of short stories, some are good, some are just OK, and some are fantastic. Surprisingly (to me, anyway), none of my favourites turned out […]

Filed Under: Fiction Tagged With: Fiction, horror, johnny mains, robin ince, short stories

TheShitWizard's CBR11 Review No:3 · Genres: Fiction · Tags: Fiction, horror, johnny mains, robin ince, short stories ·
Rating:
· 2 Comments
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