Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Coming out of my cage and I’ve been doing just fine

Dreadful Company by Vivian Shaw

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As I mentioned in my review, I really enjoyed Vivian Shaw’s Strange Practice, the first in a series of novels following Dr. Greta Helsing, a physician to the undead. I flew through it so quickly that I pretty much immediately went out and bought the rest of the series, the second of which is Dreadful Company. This installment sees Greta leaving London and visiting Paris for a medical conference, accompanied by her vampiric friend Lord Edmund Ruthven. Greta comes to the attention of a previous […]

“I am so tired of this gothic crap,” I muttered. “Just once, I want to meet the villain in a cheerful, brightly lit room. Possibly one with kittens.”

An Artificial Night by Seanan McGuire

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This was the book that almost made me stop reading the October Daye series the first time I read it, still hated it the second time I read, and the third time is no better. It’s not just that this is one of the most dark and depressing books in the series (though it is), it’s not just that the entire book comes across as Toby being constantly behind the eight ball; it’s just bleak and disturbing and not the least bit fun to read […]

People are strange, when you’re a stranger

Strange Practice by Vivian Shaw

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The first book in Vivian Shaw’s Dr. Greta Helsing series, Strange Practice, was released in 2017. I’m somewhat surprised that it’s managed to fly under my radar for so long (seriously, how had I never even heard of these books before?), as pretty much immediately after reading the blurb on the back of the book I decided that this was something I wanted to read. Dr. Greta Helsing (a descendant of the famous vampire slayer, the family dropped the ‘Van’ part of the name at […]

Sometimes a tiny bit of blood magic is fine, right?

A Queer Trade by K.J. Charles

Rag & Bone by K.J. Charles

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A Queer Trade is set in the same time period as A Case of Possession. Crispin Trederloe is having a bad week. Returning to London after visiting his ill mother, he learns that his mentor, Mr. Marleigh, was a dangerous warlock and is now dead. Marleigh’s possessions have already been sold or marked for auction, and this includes his boxes and boxes of research. Marleigh and Crispin practice blood magic, which is both extremely dangerous, unpredictable, and explicitly forbidden by England’s magical overseers. At fifteen, […]

“All I wanted to do was come home, because without you, I don’t have a home.”

Wolfsong: A Green Creek Novel (Book One) by TJ Klune

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Wolfsong is the fourth book by TJ Klune I’ve read (the others being Under the Whispering Door, The House in the Cerulean Sea, and Somewhere Beyond the Sea), and it’s the first that I’m not one hundred-percent sure what I think of it. It is also not exactly the book that was described on the back of the book; not really a bad thing, I just don’t quite understand why publishing companies have been doing this lately. The writing is a little staccato (though I […]

Talking Cats are Still Cats

The Olympian Affair by Jim Butcher

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My introduction to Jum Butcher was The Aeronaut’s Windlass (Cinder Spires 1) published in 2015 (the publication date will matter in a minute). It’s a sort of steampunk/fantasy/speculative adventure; I really enjoyed the characters (including the talking cats), world, and general story. I checked out his main series, the Dresden Files, but got tired of that after a few volumes. I have limited tolerance for the kind of story where things just keep going from bad to worse, and often the personal drama is avoidable. […]



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