Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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vel veeter's Reviews:

A Meaningful Life – LJ Davis (1971)

A Meaningful Life by LJ Davis

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There’s a way that the 1960s feels like it belongs to the past and the 1970s belongs to the present. That’s not a clear break, as movies and novels heading even to the 1980s still feel part of the past. For example, Network feels past and so does the Lorrie Moore story “How to be the Other Woman”. Movies like Patton and The Sting feel like the past, but something like Rocky or Deer Hunter feel like the present. There’s also transitional books and movies […]

Founding Brothers – Joseph Ellis (2000)

Founding Brothers by Joseph Ellis

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This past summer I read Joseph Ellis’s American Dialogue, and I was pretty taken by his clarity of thinking, how well and fluidly he knew his material, how widely read he was, and by his ability to both present the information clearly for the reader and to make it interesting. I was also very taken by his refusal to treat his subjects as either hagiography or polemic. I had been suspect because he’s written so much about the constitutional general, and because so much of […]

Ghost Lights – Lydia Millet (2011)

Ghost Lights by Lydia Millet

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I guess when I read the follow up to this book and thought, oh it’s called a trilogy but it’s NOT REALLY a trilogy, I might have been wrong? I was reading this one and the plot partially involves a 50 year old man who works for the the IRS believing that his wife, with whom he kind of does and doesn’t have an open relationship with, is cheating on him, or if they do kind of have an open relationship, then sleeping with someone […]

Everyone Knows your Mother is a Witch – Rivka Galchen (2021) and 1919 by Eve Ewing (2019)

Everyone Knows your Mother is a Waitch by Rivka Galchen

1919 by Eve Ewing

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Everyone Knows your Mother is a Witch It’s fair to look at this cover, font, and image and make some assumptions about what you’re about to read. I had the joy and probably making those assumptions, but not actually looking up what this book was about. I had read Rivka Galchen’s pillow book book and really enjoyed it so I was always already going to read this one. While the presentation of the book might not match its exact subject, the tone surely does. It’s […]

Writings about Life – Annie Ernaux

A Woman's Story by Annie Ernaux

A Man's Place by Annie Ernaux

Possession by Annie Ernaux

A Simple Passion by Annie Ernaux

Happening by Annie Ernaux

Exteriors by Annie Ernaux

I Remain in Darkness by Annie Ernaux

Shame by Annie Ernaux

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A Man’s Place In short biography of her father, inspired by his death at 67 from a heart attack, Ernaux explains how her position (born in 1940, a woman) moving into a more open post-war France, becoming educated, and becoming a teacher creates a kind of class wedge that drives a furthering distance between her and her parents. Specifically in this book, she ties this wedge to her becoming a certified teacher almost immediately preceding the death of her father. If memoir is often a […]

The Years – Annie Ernaux (2008)

The Years by Annie Ernaux

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Wow. This is both is pretty amazing. It’s called The Years, and it’s presented as a kind of anti-narrative like an annals or other time keeping, but not storytelling history format. It’s an anti-memoir at times, and while there’s no “plot” pre se, there’s a implied plot throughout via a kind of impression or cut out, clearly articulated of where the plot would go and what shape it would take. This is a memoir told through many declarative statements about both a singular woman, but […]



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