Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“She was Grendel’s mother; she was vengeance incarnate.”

Hench by Natalie Zina Walschots

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Bingo 22: Rec’d Those Goodreads emails that include “stuff currently popular” are often annoying, but sometimes skimming them pays off. I saw a review of the sequel to Hench, which led to me clicking on Hench, and being convinced to pick it up from the library based on those reviews. We’ll call that “recommended”. Imagine the world governed by super heroes and supervillains, but the heroes might be as destructive and violent and generally damaging as the villains. Anna is a temp worker for a […]

An Apocalyptic Treat

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

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I was three-quarters through Emily St. John Mandel’s Station Eleven before the panic set in. Up until that point, I was engrossed in Mandel’s tale about an apocalyptic pandemic that killed 99% of those who contracted it, but it hadn’t gotten under my skin per se. In this world, only small groups of people survived the devastating and quick-killing flu, and all the features of civilization had disappeared: electricity, motorized transportation and airplanes, medical facilities, communications, and mechanized industry. As I read on, Mandel’s detailed […]

Dan might be a dolphin, but James the Stanton needs help!

I Think Our Friend Dan Might Be a Dolphin by James the Stanton

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I think that James the Stanton might be a little crazy. Okay, a lot crazy. Afterall, why would someone write a book (or more actually a zine) called I Think Our Friend Dan Might Be a Dolphin and proceed to make one of the more warped things I have ever read (and honestly I think I’ve read several warped things). I hated everything about this book. It was too small. It was too blue. It was really really NSFW or  anyplace else for that matter. […]

Trouble the Waters: Tales from the Deep Blue by Sheree Renée Thomas (Editor), Pan Morigan (Goodreads Author) (Editor), Troy L. Wiggins (Editor)

Trouble the Waters: Tales from the Deep Blue by Sheree Renée Thomas

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Well that’s a wrap for me for Halloween Bingo 2025. Last book. I can also say I am a little horror’ed out right now so am switching to some lighter stuff. I thought Trouble the Waters was really good. Some stories hit home and others legit made my skin crawl (that crawdad story still is freaking me out). Water Dreaming by Pan Morigan was a nice set up to this anthology. We are Called to the Water by Troy L. Wiggins gives us a different perspective of how precious […]

Black Cover and Maybe Some Black Hearts or not so Black

The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo

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Bingo 19: Black Leigh Bardugo’s The Familiar has a cover almost entirely in the proper color. Mostly, this is a story about people who want things they think they either cannot or should not have. Luiza is part Jewish (dangerous during the Inquisition) and has some minor household magic; her milagritos are things like she can make the bread unburnt. She wants to be something more than the scullery maid; she wants better, more money, more comfort, just more. There’s also her boss Valentina who […]

“An act of translation is always an act of betrayal.”

Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators’ Revolution by R. F Kuang

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1828. Robin Swift, orphaned by cholera in Canton, is brought to England by Professor Lovell, a mysterious Englishman who happened to appear at his mother’s deathbed . Once there, he trains for years at a grueling pace in Latin, Ancient Greek, and Chinese, all in preparation for the day he’ll enroll in Oxford University’s prestigious Royal Institute of Translation—also known as Babel. (And yes, it’s a tower; subtlety, this England doth not have it.) Babel is the world’s center for translation and, more importantly, magic. […]



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