Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“It turned out that some crooked things looked even worse when straightened. Some tangled knots only made sense once unraveled.”

Wool by Hugh Howey

by 1 Comment

I know it’s only January 20th so this is a bold claim, but Wool is going to be on my top 10 list of books I read in 2024. This novel started as a standalone short story “Holston,” but upon its publication and soaring popularity, Howey wrote four more stories that have now been bound together in this first volume. And it gripped me from page one through the very end. This is exactly the kind of book that I love to read in winter, […]

dystopian utopian escapism

The Future by Naomi Alderman

by Leave a Comment

I will give this book a pass because it does get better towards the end, but to explain would ruin the reason for which the book gets good! More relevantly I don’t think it’s as good as The Power, but it’s definitely an engaging book. Despite only having read one book by David Eggers (The Circle) I do get a similar vibe from Alderman’s work. The genre is scifi, set in a near future that seems rather reasonable but with a few tweaks that are exaggerations […]

Definitely a… Creative approach, and a good one too

Several People Are Typing by Calvin Kasulke

by Leave a Comment

This book is set in a modern day workplace, specifically a PR company. The main character, Gerald, is an everyday office worker at the company, not too significant. One day, he is sucked into Slack. He has to learn to navigate his new world with no external stimulus. His productivity is through the roof, so no one argues with it. As he begins to panic and search for help, there seems to be more afoot in this company than just the PR disaster caused by […]

“Come along, Pleiti, you can practice ethnography later. We have a murder to solve.”

The Imposition of Unnecessary Obstacles by Malka Older

by Leave a Comment

I loved Malka Older’s The Mimicking of Known Successes. The second Mossa and Pleiti novella, The Imposition of Unnecessary Obstacles was also a delightful read. There was a moment in the story when I thought back to a conversation I had years ago with a much younger cousin who was still in his 20s. He began expounding on his desire to live somewhere that tested his grit, a place with “real” problems, like on the gritty prestige cop shows he watched. I didn’t point out all […]

It remains a heartwarming story

The Wild Robot Escapes by Peter Brown

by Leave a Comment

This book is a sequel, set in the same world as the first one. (A future run by robots) It follows Roz again, this time as she is taken from her home and her son and put on a farm to work. She wishes to escape and return to her family on her island, but the two children who live on the farm discover her intentions before she can run. This book is truly adorable, and a good reminder of human compassion, especially in today’s […]

Might have found my worst of the year with my first of the year

Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi

by 1 Comment

1.5 stars Warning! This review will contain spoilers, because after my book club discussion yesterday, I’m actually quite cranky about this book, and it’s impossible for me to rant properly if I can’t spoil the heck out of these stories. Don’t worry, you don’t really want to read this book anyway. Also, most of the spoilers are only visible if you go to my blog. In a small, dark basement café in Japan, visitors can travel briefly back in time, if they observe a series […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo