Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Well, I had an experience.

DAYGLOAYHOLE #1 by Ben Passmore

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I was not going to review DAYGLOAYHOLE #1 by Ben Passmore. Mostly because I really disliked it. I mean I cannot stress how much I really disliked this book. The second reason is you can only get this book via Silver Sprocket’s website. This is probably because it is more of a zine or comic book store comic (so I guess you might be able to locate it at your local comic store), and less of a traditional graphic novel.  But when I realized that […]

Adult literacy

My Kentucky Moonlight School by Kim Michele Richardson

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My Kentucky Moonlight School is another book (read via an online reader) due in August 2026 but is a must to talk about now. Kim Michele Richardson’s story is about a family, their community and how they learn to read during “Moonlight sessions” of schooling. It is sweet, educational and even a little humorous at times.  This is enhanced by Chloe M. Giroux who illustrates the adventures of this family with earthy tones, bright shading and light use, and just the right amount of details. […]

The woman and the slave girl

Raging Clouds by Yudori

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Books sometimes find me. I was going to the library to pick up some I had ordered and Raging Clouds by Yudori was sitting off to the side of the entrance. I almost didn’t go that way to the checkout desk (I usually go left, not right) but something made me go right. And there it was. Fat, shiny and new. It was shyly facing away from me. And that’s the last time this book was shy. Even the librarian when I checked it out wasn’t […]

What stars are made of

The Curious Life of Cecilia Payne: Discovering the Stuff of Stars by Laura Alary

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TITLE: The Curious Life of Cecilia Payne: Discovering the Stuff of Stars AUTHOR:  Laura Alary ILLUSTRATOR:  Yas Imamura  PUB DATE: Late January 2026 READ AS: Online reader copy RESULT:  Dang this is good! NEED MORE?: YES OKAY MORE: This is a picture book about Cecila Payne, who was a young girl who did not fit in. She stood out in many ways not just because she was taller than other girls/women, not just because she was a female, but because she really loved nature and […]

So Apartheid South Africa Was Way More Complicated than Black vs White

Let the Dead Lie by Malla Nunn

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So we are back in the newly segregated apartheid version of South Africa, as formed in the 1950s.  Detective Emmanuel Cooper has had to revert from his former status as WWII vet and (most importantly) white person, to mixed race instead.  But Major van Niekerk (white Afrikaner) has a need for him and his partner and friend, the Zulu Detective Constable Samuel Shabalala, tracker extraordinaire.  A poor young white boy, Jolly Marks, had been found in the port town of Durban, South Africa, near the […]

Golden Girls with Feet of Clay

The It Girls by Caroline Young

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Nowadays, when one thinks of someone who’s “famous for being famous,” one thinks of the Kardashians or Instagram influencers. But the phenomenon of the It girl is a long and storied one. I read this at about the same time as I read Skirts: Fashioning Modern Femininity in the Twentieth Century, and they work pretty well as companions – that book describing trendsetting fashion, and this book describing the trendsetters themselves. Young tells the story of It girls through the centuries, who hold such diverse […]



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