Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“Never fear quarrels, but seek hazardous adventures.”

The Three Musketeers (The d'Artagnan Romances, #1) by Alexandre Dumas

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Nobody told me this book would be funny! Well, in case you didn’t know it, this book is funny! I did know it would be ridiculously long, but I did the audiobook, and Bill Homewood was a very fun narrator, and it didn’t feel as long as it could have. For some reason, I’ve always thought this book would be boring, but it’s a swashbuckling adventure Romance, so in hindsight that was a weird opinion to have. Maybe because the cover looks boring, or I’m […]

“He kissed for his enjoyment and mine, and we staggered and stumbled our way to the ground, still kissing for the sheer glory of being alive, the wonder of finding a congenial soul in the world, and the very real prospect of being dead before the weekend.”

The Henchmen of Zenda by K.J. Charles

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This honestly might be five stars on re-read, but I’ve been handing out five star ratings like they’re candy, and I’ve come off my book high now. This is a strong 4.5 stars for now. Firstly, this is a retelling of The Prisoner of Zenda, a Ruritanian Romance/Adventure/Swashbuckler from the late 1800s, written by Anthony Hope. I’ve never read the original, but before diving into this I did read the detailed summary of the book and I’m really glad I did that, because it was […]

They sure did smoke all the time back in the day, didn’t they? (double bingo)

Madam, Will You Talk? by Mary Stewart

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CBR14 Bingo: Question (the book’s title is a question and there is a central murder mystery where the identity of the murderer is in question) Young widow Charity Selborne is on holiday in the south of France with her friend Louise and they really have little planned except to enjoy the good food, nice drinks, beautiful scenery, and long drives. In Avignon, Charity befriends a young English boy who is also staying at the hotel, offering to take him with her on tours of the […]

You should all drop whatever you are doing and join me in my current obsession (double bingo)

Lore Olympus, vol 2 by Rachel Smythe

Lore Olympus, vol 3 by Rachel Smythe

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4.5 stars CBR14 Bingo: Adapted (Rachel Smythe’s modern take on the Greek myths – and obviously especially Hades and Persephone is so cleverly done) So, searching my blog and Goodreads to see what I wrote about Lore Olympus, my current web-comic obsession, I discovered that after finishing volume one in November last year, all I did was leave a two-sentence comment on Goodreads. If I recall correctly, I was pretty solidly burned out last winter, so I’m amazed I posted any reviews in the final months […]

“You put dinosaurs and people together, you always get screaming.” (Bingo)

Just One Damned Thing After Another by Jodi Taylor

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CBR14 Bingo: Time (the whole book is about time travel to different points in Earth’s history) Dr. Madeleine “Max” Maxwell is recruited by the seemingly rather mundane St. Mary’s Institute of History, only to discover that they are actually a secret organisation that time travels to various points in history, for research purposes. Obviously, you can’t just throw anyone into a time machine and have at it, so there’s a lot of training. Then there’s the fact that time travel is rather dangerous, and she […]

The greatest true-life adventure story ever told, now with more photos

The Endurance: Shackleton's Legendary Antarctic Expedition by Caroline Alexander, with photos by Frank Hurley

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CBR 14 BINGO: Bodies, because the men on this ship were pushed physically beyond all reasonable limits, and also because one member of the expedition team lost all the toes on one foot. Also, it involves crossing bodies of water. BINGO: Snake, Shadow, Cold, Rec’d, Bodies In 2019, I read Alfred Lansing’s Endurance about Ernest Shackleton’s ill-fated 1914 Antarctic expedition, and it became one of my favorite books of the year. Shortly after, this book by Caroline Alexander, a companion piece to a 1999 exhibition […]



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