Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

The Wheat Whisper or Father of the Green Revolution,

Hero for the Hungry : The Life and Work of Work of Norman Borlaug by Peggy Thomas

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While back, an email came into my possession containing the (currently available) reader copy of Hero for the Hungry : The Life and Work of Work of Norman Borlaug  by Peggy Thomas and illustrator Sam Kalda. The first part of the first half was interesting. It gave a nice introduction to the man that was Norman Borlaug. Starting with him as a young farm child to his college years, we see how he would eventually end up in Mexico learning as much as he would […]

Baseball Like You’ve Never Seen It

Fifty-Nine in "84: Old Hoss Radbourn, Barehanded Baseball, and the Greatest Season a Pitcher Ever Had by Edward Achorn

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If you’re a baseball fan who also happened to be on Twitter in the pre-Elon days, the name Old Hoss Radbourn will probably be familiar to you via the brilliant parody twitter account pretending to be the great pitcher of old, humorously carping about the national pastime and how much easier contemporary players had it. The Old Hoss was, in fact, a real ballplayer named Charles Radbourn (or Radbourne, depending on the source.) He’s in the Hall of Fame, having won over three hundred games […]

Careening over the cliff, crashing into the ocean, and exploding on impact.

The Favorites by Layne Fargo

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They didn’t simply want us to be lovers. They wanted us to be so in love, we’d burn the whole world down to be together. ― Layne fargo, The Favorites I have a backlog of reviews to write, but it took a truly bonkers story to yank me out of my holding pattern, tear open my window, and scream into the void. The Favorites is that story. This book has everything. Buckets of blood? Check. Violently gory injuries with ice skates? Check. Skating partners who […]

Bishop might take Knight, but the Queen wins

Elsa's Chessboard by Jenny Andrus

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For the grandmother that wanted to play chess with her granddaughter, author Jenny Andrus wrote Elsa’s Chessboard. She was a child who did not have interest in an “old dusty game,” but now she is giving us a peek at the woman who would change chess in ways unexpected. Based on the life of Elsa Konstandt Weisz, we go from Vienna to San Francisco as a young Jewish woman flees WWII and makes a new home in the United States, all the while keeping her […]

Play ball, swim, tennis, hockey and more safely and comfortably

This Skirt Won't Work!: How Women Athletes Changed Their Clothes and Changed the Game by Jennifer Cooper

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History has many layers. Dresses can have many layers.  But whereas history plays out, it is hard to play most sports or ride a bicycle in dresses. Especially the outfits that many women athletes would wear before some enterprising women decided to change things up. This Skirt Won’t Work!: How Women Athletes Changed Their Clothes and Changed the Game by Jennifer Cooper and illustrator Eva Byrne follows how tennis went from a long skirt to a 1920s fashion statement. How women hockey players would change […]

Fun to be had and fears to overcome

Ruby's School Walk (Bilingual Portuguese & English) (Barefoot Bilinguals) by Kathryn White

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When I received my envelope of goodies from Barefoot Press awhile back, Ruby’s School Walk (Bilingual Portuguese & English) (Barefoot Bilinguals) in paperback was among the books. The contributors are Kathryn White and Miriam Latimer. I was unfamiliar with the title even though I check the new titles from the publisher periodically. But even if I had seen it, since it was bilingual I might have passed it by. Yet, I am glad I did not and had this finished copy sent to me. Because […]



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