Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Succession, but make it magic

Gifted & Talented by Olivie Blake

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Olivie Blake is one of those authors that I like, but recognize the flaws in her writing enough that I rarely recommend her work (so, only if I know more about the personality and preferences of the person I would be recommending it to). She tends to write books where the plot goes completely off the rails, but something about her writing style really vibes with me. Her characters are frequently unlikeable but have realistic flaws (somewhat uncomfortably, ones that are relatable enough to me) […]

Quoth the Raven ‘WE ARE MAGNIFICENT’

The Raven Scholar by Antonia Hodgson

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I have a bit of a fascination with ravens, so when I saw Antonia Hodgson’s new release The Raven Scholar at the bookstore, it immediately caught my eye (it’s also purple and shiny, two other things that please me for no logical reason). I didn’t know much about the author or the plot, so I went into this one fairly blind. Set in a world where people can join organizations (somewhat of a mix between religious and vocational) dedicated to the sort-of God-spirits of various […]

She had come to save this world and it was already dead.

The Blighted Stars by Megan E. O’Keefe

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I wasn’t really looking for something dark and twisty, but I fell into listening to Ciaran Saward narrate Megan E. O’Keefe’s The Blighted Stars and it was exactly what I wanted. I knew nothing going in, so I’m going to try to say as little as possible while also getting you interested enough to go listen. Tarquin Mercator is a space Prince, the only son of one of the universe’s ruling families. He is an academic, a geologist, who has mostly not been involved in […]

Of Birds and Trees

The Warbler by Sarah Beth Durst

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This one feels a bit more similar to Sarah Beth Durst’s novel, The Lost, than some of her other more recently published ones – even if The Lost is my most recently read of her. Something about the main character in this one felt very reminiscent of that earlier novel, and both novels were centered within a version of our world rather than within a fantasy world setting (like Race the Sand or The Spellshop). Regardless of the setting, mother-daughter relationships always play a prominent […]

“Nice things don’t happen in storybooks or when they do happen, something bad happens next. Because otherwise the story would be boring, and no one would read it.”

The Cruel Prince: The Folk of the Air Book One by Holly Black

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“If I cannot be better than them, I will become so much worse.” There are books I read and hate, books I read and like, books I read and enjoy, and books that I read and become so obsessed with they take up far too much space in my head; this is one that fits in the last category. Jude Duarte lived in the mortal world (probably somewhere in the New Jersey/New York area as that seems to be where Holly Black bases most of […]

“Run away with me. You like tea. I like books. Care to open a shop and forget the world exists?”

Can’t Spell Treason Without Tea by Rebecca Thorne

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Don’t we all want to run away with the person we love to open a bookshop/cafe in a small village somewhere? That’s all Reyna and Kianthe want to do. However, when one’s the guard of a tantrum-prone murderous queen and the other’s the most powerful mage in the land, it’s a bit difficult. After getting kidnapped, Reyna decides that the spoiled little bit of royalty she works for has had enough of her life, and finally takes Kianthe up on her offer to run away […]



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