Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Something sweet

On the Corner of Chocolate Avenue: How Milton Hershey Bought Milk Chocolate to America by Tziporah Cohen

Milloo's Mind: the Story of Maryam Faruqi, Trailblazer for Women's Education by Reem Faruqi

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This is the first year I do not have a nephew in school. I have three cousins who are still going (one who is a junior or senior in high school, one almost in high school and one almost (or is) junior high), but it is not the same. Do I feel old? A little, but because I am mostly young at heart, and I can read picture books, I can still think I am that kid reading 100 books for summer reading challenges and […]

Eating some delicious bugs and solving a mystery

Booker the Library Bat Volume 1: The New Guard by Jess Brallier

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Booker is a library bat. This means, like the real bats of the Joanine Library in Portugal (which eat around 500 bugs per bat per night, keeping the books safe from book eating bugs) he protects the books in the library he lives in. On his first night as a guard, with three old-timers (my favorite is Rocco who uses gel in his fur but they are all adorable), he decides to check out the library to get the lay of the land. That night […]

When your food talks

What the Bread Says: Baking with Love, History and Papan by Vanessa Garcia

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What the Bread Says: Baking with Love, History and Papan is that this Vanessa Garcia and Tim Plain book is too short. Or maybe that is just me thinking that. Either way, Garcia talks about how bread can tell you something about where it comes from, the people who make it and more. We follow the young narrator as she and her Papan (grandfather/pan means bread in Spanish) make different types of bread. At the same time, her grandfather gives her a story as well […]

Food, Family, Fun

The Blue Bowl by Flo Leung

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The year 2024 is shaping up to have several interesting looking books, and picture books in particular. March 2024 will be giving us a story of how a young boy, Max, loves his family and their culture, but who also likes other things too within the pages of The Blue Bowl.   We see how Max and his family celebrate, how this family comes together in one large group of fun, and when the special blue bowls come out, he knows it is a very special […]

Wonderland-esque

The Wondrous Wonders by Camille Jourdy

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I thought that The Wondrous Wonders was going to be a quirky, but fun story about a young girl and wonderful, magical creatures that she has adventures with. It is an unusual fairytale that hints at the classics, but has some fresh ideas. Yet, the girl is not sweet; in fact, she is a self-proclaimed brat. Jo (we learn her name is) is dealing with her parents divorce, fathers remarriage and step siblings. She runs away from the area they are camping in, and decides […]

The Joy of Celebration

Zingerman’s Bakehouse: Celebrate Every Day by Amy Emberling, Lindsay-Jean Hard, Lee Vedder, and Corynn Coscia

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I have never been to Ann Arbor, Michigan, but I am a long time reader of the Zingerman’s catalog. I’ve even ordered bread from the Bakehouse, back before I was a more confident baker. I have very warm feelings for Zingerman’s Bakehouse. Zingerman’s Bakehouse: Celebrate Every Day lives up to those warm feelings. It’s so friendly. In the introduction, Bakehouse Managing Partner Amy Emberling talked about how the cookbook came to be, both the inspiration and the process. I love that it is a pandemic […]



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