Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Once Upon a time a baby named Tess was adopted….

Giant Tess by Dan Yaccarino

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Dan Yaccarino is known for a quirky style, but usually good, solid stories.  This time, Giant Tess combines classic Yaccarino and an old school flair to create a modern fairy tale. Which, unfortunately, is an obvious story that has been done before. It is a case of “Be yourself and anyone of any size can be a hero.” Tess, adopted as a baby, grows so quickly there is no denying it, she is a giant. And that, as one can assume, does not always work […]

When my 10-year-old past-life boy and my 40-something-now-life like the same book

How to Take Care of Your Dinosaur by Jason Cockcroft

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I admit it. I was a 10-year-old-boy in some past life as I love a good fart or poop joke. And this book has a steaming pile of a good poop joke in it. And thankfully, the rest of How to Take Care of Your Dinosaur by Jason Cockcroft is fun as well. And (mostly) not as messy either. While we have seen this theme before done with unicorns, trains, monsters, and all sorts of creatures, the “taking care” of your pet dinosaur story is […]

No brain! Keep walking.

Adulthood is a Myth by Sarah Andersen

Maneaters Vol 1 by Chelsea Cain

Sea Prayer by Khaled Hosseini

Big Mushy Happy Lump by Sarah Andersen

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So let me explain this post first: sometimes I go to a bunch of libraries all in one day. Yesterday I went to four different libraries across two different divisions, a county and a city. And the goal of all this is to find a handful of audiobooks (books on cd) to rip onto my computer. I do this for two reasons: audiobooks make up about half of the books I read because I have a 30 minute commute each day plus I show up […]

“I mean, you can know someone is dying on an intellectual level, but emotionally it hasn’t really hit you, and then when it does, that’s when you feel like sh**.”

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews

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Me and Earl and the Dying Girl is typical Jesse Andrews. This style of writing is exactly like Haters (I read them in reverse). The nice thing is both are standalone titles. I read the paper edition but looked at the hardcover and movie cover editions and have to say, I like the bright yellow cover best. Then the hard cover as it makes the characters somewhat like I pictured them. However, the movie? Oh boy! I think they totally missed on what the characters […]

Q: What did the quater say to the penny?

Spend It! (Moneybunny) by Cinders McLeod

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Spend It! is one in a series of books for kids learning about money.  Along with Earn It! and Save It! (and possibly a future title Give It!) the reader finds out that money is not as straight forward as one might think. Cinders McLeod, in this book, talks about understanding your choices when it comes to money. Our bunny hero, Sonny, has three carrots, therefore, that means he can buy three things, right? Wrong! As he quickly learns. (Though you got to love that […]

Female memoirs about growing up in California and then moving to New York written by actresses!

Where Am I Now? True Stories of Girlhood and Accidental Fame by Mara Wilson

The Misadventures of Awkward Black Girl by Issa Rae

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Where Am I Now? 3.5 Stars I enjoyed Where Am I Now? back in CBR8 and decided to revisit it this year as an audio-book. Mara Wilson narrates her memoir which threw me off because the Mara Wilson of 2016 does not sound like I imagined. It’s not like I was  expecting her to still have her 1993 lisp but it was still jarring to my auditory system. Most people have embarrassing videos of themselves as children. Few have theirs copyrighted by Twentieth Century Fox. Wilson’s […]



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