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.

 

“their houses would have wider doors, higher ceilings, and stronger floors so that Esteban’s memory could go everywhere without bumping into beams”

The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World by Gabriel García Márquez, Gregory Rabassa (Translator)

by Leave a Comment

I have been circling Gabriel García Márquez for decades, almost too afraid to approach his work at all. On and off the reading lists his works go, a constant pendulum of my ambition or lack thereof. When staring at our Bingo squares and realizing a few short stories and novellas were likely to help my progress I went on the hunt for a few and The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World by Gabriel García Márquez came up. Here we go, I thought – here’s […]

The Cultish Homecoming

Black Sheep by Rachel Harrison

by 3 Comments

There was a lot going on in the week following my purchase of this book, one I grabbed with great anticipation. So I saved it for the last few days to really savor the experience. Rachel Harrison’s The Return was a sneaky good read; I felt like I was on her storytelling wavelength and that helped overcome the many negative reviews that, I think, missed the point of her book. And now she’s writing a book about returning home to a religious cult? Hell yeah, let’s […]

Queer as Folk(tales)!

Tales From Beyond the Rainbow by Pete Jordi Wood

by 2 Comments

In pursuit of the idea that queer people have always existed (and therefore will persist), Pete Jordi Wood has put together this gorgeous collection of folk and fairy tales that earlier folklorists chose to “clean up” or dismiss. Tales From Beyond the Rainbow: Ten LGBTQ+ Fairy Tales Proudly Reclaimed is a darling little book with big important stories. While earning his folklore degree, Pete found a Danish folktale “The Dog and the Sailor” that felt undeniably queer. He self-published his translation of the tale, and […]

CBRBINGO – ADULTHOOD: “For this scribe has read a great many of these accounts and taken away another lesson: that to be a woman is to have your story misremembered.”

The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by Shannon Chakraborty

by Leave a Comment

I loved this! I’m so glad I loved it, also, because I own two copies of it and I don’t want to get rid of either one. They are PRETTY. The American cover I love so much, I want a poster-sized print of it for my wall. And my other edition has a beautiful gilded map on the endpapers with Amina and Payasam on either end, and little ships and sea beasts sprayed on the edges. I would have CRIED had I not loved this […]

Beautiful book whether you’re a baking newbie or a pro

What’s For Dessert: Simple Recipes for Dessert People by Claire Saffitz

by 1 Comment

Cbr15bingo Guide, Bingo BLACKOUT Last year I reviewed Claire Saffitz’s first cookbook Dessert Person, giving it two thumbs up. Her second collection, What’s For Dessert, is another great collection of recipes organized in a way that is super helpful to the baker, whether novice or pro. As I pointed out in that earlier review, I am not exactly handy in the kitchen but I do like baking. The biggest obstacle I run in to is that half of my household is gluten/casein/soy free, which can […]

As They Say, When in Rome. . . No, Wait, Actually Don’t

I, Claudius by Robert Graves

by 2 Comments

cbr15 bingo Sex cbr15 passport Rome   You know what would have really helped me make sense of all this would have been a family tree.  This was worse than Russian novels, where everyone has at least four names and a nickname.  But these guys changed names whenever they felt like it, used a limited set to choose from (Nero?  Oh, not THAT Nero), divorced and hooked up depending on the politics of the moment, and let’s not even get into the suicides, forced and […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo