Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Witty, funny, and definitely fanfiction

Politically Correct Bedtime Stories by James Finn Garner

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CBR 16 Bingo – Fanfic: I really struggled to find something I actually wanted to read for this category, but I finally found it. You might argue that this isn’t fanfiction, but it meets the definition so what can you do. It’s an adaptation of the original story written by an appreciator of the works. I don’t see the problem. You know a book is going to be good when it has a quote this spectacular. “The wolf said, ‘You know, my dear, it isn’t […]

Exactly the Christmas/Holiday Stories I Need Right Now

Upon the Midnight Queer by ‘Nathan Burgoine

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They brought their own light, and found they were not alone. I am so grateful to have had ‘Nathan Burgoine’s Upon the Midnight Queer on my kindle the past two days. Burgoine is sharing his holiday tradition with us, Christmas stories that center queer folks. In each of the 11 stories, he reminds us that queer people have always existed and found community with each other. In a world that is often not safe for the different, we find each other and share our light. […]

Taverns have ale flowing, wenches are wenching and pirates pirating.

Sea of Thieves by Jeremy Whitley

Sea of Thieves: Origins Volume One by Jeremy Whitley

Sea of Thieves: Origins: Champion of Souls by Jeremy Whitley

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I started with Sea of Thieves: Sea Dog’s Search illustrated by Rhoald Marcellius. Though it says it has issues one to three, it was actually after the no added title, Sea of Thieves. We meet our main pirate twins, their friends, frenemies and a possible lover or two or three…. Here we build up the story of all the characters we find in the second book (or the main ones) and we learn about a few creatures and events. However, you needed Sea of Thieves: […]

“They carried all they could bear, and then some, including a silent awe for the terrible power of the things they carried.”

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien

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Somehow, despite being an English major in college and a big reader my whole life, this is a classic I had never heard of or come across. I discovered it in a very weird way, which I’ll detail after my brief review. (Isn’t reviewing classics weird? What else can you add to the narrative?) This finalist for the Pulitzer is a vibrant, gripping meditation on war, specifically, the Vietnam War, and I’m glad it’s been a focus in the American education system over the years, […]

A nice anthology of mildly gruesome stories

Revenge by Yoko Ogawa

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This is an anthology of interconnected short stories that takes place in Tokyo in an indeterminate time, but presumably sometime in the 1990s. Each of the stories (of which there are eleven) is from the perspective of a different character, and shares some commonality to the story that immediately precedes it. In “Afternoon at the Bakery”, for instance, the narrator enters a bakery for some strawberry shortcake. It’s her son’s birthday who (it is revealed) is now dead. That is what his last birthday cake […]

“It’s about being treated as a thing, isn’t it. You’re a thing, and there is no safety.”

Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory (The Murderbot Diaries #4.5) by Martha Wells

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Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory is the last new-to-me Murderbot other than the most recent novel last year’s System Collapse (I’m planning on getting to it before the year is out, but we’ll see how I do). I knew very little going in, just that it was Mensah’s POV, occurred immediately after the events of Exit Strategy, that it was initially given free to people who pre-ordered Network Effect (its now free online), and that it was a short story.   Knowing that, I still don’t […]



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