Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

We care too much, or not enough

The Plot by Jean Hanff Korelitz

Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood

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It feels weird putting these two in the same review, but there you have it. I’ve been struck by the dreaded reading slump.  The Plot (Jean Hanff Korelitz) ** The plot of The Plot: author Jacob is struggling. His first novel made a modest impact, but didn’t sell well despite positive reviews. His second novel went ignored entirely. To make ends meet, Jacob teaches writing to a group of wannabes and one of them tells him the plot of a novel he is planning to […]

“People like to believe that there is nothing we do not know. The human body, for instance: people tell themselves that all of its mysteries have already been uncovered….

Not Quite A Ghost by Anne Ursu

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The genome has been mapped. The systems studied. Everything is known. Just like theworld, they tell themselves. The mysteries have all been solved. There is nothing that could possibly lurk beyond what humans can apprehend. They are wrong. When a virus slips its way into a body, sometimes that body reacts in unexpected ways. It marshals all its defenses and attacks; after all, the virus does not mean well—and then, sometimes, even when the intruder is gone, it keeps attacking. It doesn’t even remember why. […]

“It came to something when you found yourself hoping that the footsteps you heard were ghosts.”

All of Us Murderers by KJ Charles

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I am ever so pleased with my first Aardvark book! Only my third 5-star rating of the year (although a couple have been close).  I chose this one on vibes – I was partway through Band Sinister and enjoying myself, loved the cover, and was in the mood to say yes to some gothic mystery goodness. All of Us Murderers is KJ Charles playing with all the gothic novel tropes and putting her own spin on making the queer textual in a genre where it was subtext for most of its history.  The book starts with […]

That Rumpelstiltskin is my name

Rumpelstiltskin by Mac Barnett and Carson Ellis

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Do you like fairy or folk tales? Do you like pure telling of said fairy tales with a small change? And do you like Rumpelstiltskin? Or at least the story, it is a little hard to like Rumpelstitskin. And if you answered yes to any of the above, you should read Mac Barnett’s version of the story. It is the story we know: king meets a miller, who brags about how awesome his daughter is, the king is greedy and wants the spun gold, the […]

Not a buddy movie

Stray by Ryu Kamio

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Reading via an online reader copy is sometimes hard for me. But I persevere and just keep swimming, I mean reading. But with Stray there was the added issue of a big ol’ “watermark” in the middle of things. Nope, they did not want people copying the manga comic by Ryu Kamio and illustrator Nakamura Yuu. Plus, it is manga and therefore, the flow is off for my western eyes to start. With that said, a few days after starting, I finished this Yakuza meets […]

“The case does look very black against you. Nevertheless, I accept your assurance.”

The Witness for the Prosecution by Agatha Christie

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Last year I read my first ever Agatha Christie novel and enjoyed the experience so much that I put another on this year’s list. Without a better idea of where to start I hunted up works published by Christie in 1925 and the short story now known as The Witness for the Prosecution fit the bill. I didn’t know much going in about what the story contained and decided that was probably for the best.   This 50-minute audio (read by the incomparable Christopher Lee) is an excellent example of how Christie honed in on the mechanics of writing to tell her […]



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