Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Featured Review Archive

These reviews, which were promoted in CBR social media, on our homepage, and in Pajiba Love, appear below by review publication date, not by date featured.

 

Bruh.

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

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As my kids would say.  A Little Life is a behemoth of a book, focused on the lives of four college friends as they make their way in the world. There’s Willem, attractive and easy-going, who wants to be an actor; Malcolm, an aspiring architect; JB, a promising your artist; and Jude, an enigmatic lawyer with a brilliant mind and a troubled past. We follow their lives as they grapple with fame, addiction, relationships and trauma.  At least, that’s what google will tell you if […]

Not Murderbot, but still good

Witch King by Martha Wells

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I was first introduced to Martha Wells through the reviews of Emmalita – it still took me too long to get there, but once I started the series, I read each book in very quick succession. So, when I was travelling for work and ran out of book, I was so pleased to see Wells’ Witch King at my favourite bookstore. It was on sale! Hardcover! Reasonably sized for carry on! Our protagonist is Kaiiesteron, known as Kai, a demon whose spirit/soul lives in the […]

Less the colour of magic, more the shades

Until We Shatter by Kate Dylan

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Over a year ago now I signed up for a subscription to Illumicrate. Each month I get sent a box filled with beautiful hardback book in the fantasy / science fiction category normally with edge printing and specially done covers and end-pieces, often signed. In addition you get 4 or 5 ‘goodies’ that can be anything from a bookmark to a large fleece throw. Basically it’s a great deal and the only problem was my failure to get my act together and read the damn […]

Very Visceral

Heirs of Bone and Sea by Kay Adams

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I think I listened to the audio book to Heirs of Bone and Sea because it was a part of the “what’s making me happy this week” segment on the Pop Culture Happy Hour podcast. This was my first dual narrator audio book in a while. I liked it well enough. The world building is pretty light but the main story of a princess and a queen on the run was fun. Evhen, queen of Vodaerd and Princess Kalei of Marama are brought together when […]

“Don Quixote in a corset”

Appetites & Vices by Felicia Grossman

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Regency novel set literally anywhere other than the UK and with a Jewish heroine? Say no more. Plot: Ursula is an heiress to one of the largest banking empires in America, but she’s also Jewish and possibly a tiny bit on the spectrum so her social life is best characterized as non-existent. Fortunately, she has her giant brain, her dad, who ferociously supports her giant brain, and her quiet goy friend Hugo, who also enjoys running away from social situations to talk about books. Well, […]

I bet this will be a pretty good movie.

The Life Impossible by Matt Haig

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SPOILERS KINDA SORTA I went into this ready to love it, and mostly did. Grace is a sad and lonely woman whose son and husband have died. She’s convinced herself she’s undeserving of love, or fun, or of much of a life at all. She’s retreated into math (she’s a teacher) and is kinda just waiting for it to be over. Then she gets some crazy news regarding an inheritance, specifically of a small house on Ibiza, left to her by a former colleague she […]



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