Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

March of the DINKs

The Other Passenger by Louise Candlish

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London fortysomethings Jamie and Clare lead a happy life, at least on the surface; they’re financially stable, Clare has a good job, they live in an expensive house in a prosperous area in London and they’re enjoying life the way wealthy people with no children do. But all is not well; Jamie is stuck in a dead-end job and Clare is getting increasingly fed up with him. When they meet young, dazzling couple Kit and Melia, they seize the opportunity to become friends, but all […]

Books and Spooks

Silverview by John Le Carré

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33 year old Julian Lawndsley (yes, he’s British, why do you ask?) has had enough of life as a hardcore stock broker in the City and decides to start anew in a nameless seaside town, where he opens a book shop. He’s not an avid reader and doesn’t know a lot about books, so when a quaint, older man named Edward starts frequenting his shop, offering him advice, he seizes the opportunity. He finds himself enjoying the older man’s company, so when Edward asks him […]

Same therapist, wrong answers?

Work-Life Balance by Aisha Franz

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The graphic novel Work-Life Balance by Aisha Franz and translated from German by Nicholas Houde is an Emotion Book. Not an emotional book, but an Emotion Book. Well, it is both. You come away with feels after you see the feelings, actions, and missactions of the four characters of Franz’s book. Some of those feelings are good, some bad, some really icky, and some are “What The Flaming Monkey Toots” did I just experience????   The art (according to the publisher description) is “striking” and I […]

Graveyard Queen Series – My Kindle Says I Read These

The Restorer by Amanda Stevens

The Kingdom by Amanda Stevens

The Prophet by Amanda Stevens

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I don’t know what it is about these books. I love the idea of them.  Amelia Gray is a Graveyard Restorer.  She is commissioned by individuals or towns or organisations to clean, clear and restore old graveyards to their former glory. This can involve a lot of research, making sure that nothing is damaged or moved too far from its original positioning, and that the gravestones are all documented and assigned to their correct occupants. So far, sounds interesting, right? Also?  Amelia can see ghosts.  […]

Aggressively Meh

The House in the Pines by Ana Reyes

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This book took me a bunch of tries to get through.  It started out on the train during the Australian Open (Jan) and didn’t end up being finished until 24th May.  I attempted this everywhere I expected to be bored – in a Dr’s waiting room, on a plane – and struggled everywhere.  But in the end, finished it was.  And it was aggressively meh. I’m spoiling this, to save you the trouble of reading it, ok? Maya is a drunk, having replaced her Klonopin […]

The MacGuffin is Distracting

The Seven by Chris Hammer

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I’m going to state at the outset that I think it was a fantastic call on Chris Hammer’s part to move on from Martin Scarsden (protagonist of previous novels Scrublands, Silver and Trust) as his lead character, and instead follow Ivan and Nell, the detectives, into new novels.  Martin was getting to be annoyingly omniscient, and ever so slightly… overbearingly self righteous about it.  Following the detectives means we have a legitimate entry point into each new murder, and allows Hammer to mine the back […]



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