Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

I can only suspend my disbelief until my imaginary parachute fails

All Our Shimmering Skies by Trent Dalton

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Molly Hook is a gravedigger’s daughter stuck in a pretty miserable existence in Darwin, 1942, as the Japanese bombs start raining from the sky. After losing her mum at a very young age, she spends her days digging up graves for her father and uncle’s nefarious purposes, kept company by her friend Bert the shovel. She longs to solve the puzzle of the curse placed on her grandfather and which has plagued multiple generations of her family since. To do this she needs to go […]

The genius behind the clown

Reckoning by Magda Szubanski

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Another of my Christmas books ticked off the ‘to be read’ list.  Magda Szubanski is an Australian icon and a treasure. She has appeared on most of our tv sets at one point or another, usually in the form of Sharon, the nation’s most famous second-best friend, in arguably the country’s best ever sitcom Kath and Kim. This autobiography, written with emotion, honesty and flair, winds it way around a long road that eventually reveals the threads that bind person and character. When I say […]

Reading, Reading, Reading, RAWHIDE!

The True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey

The Dame by Richard Stark

Tricky by Josh Stallings

Quarry's Deal by Max Alan Collins

The Plea by Steve Cavanagh

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I read a lot last week but also had a busy week at work (a good busy). Every time I tried to write a review on one of these books, all of them good, I just didn’t have the time or energy. So here’s a big update dump of the stuff I read in the last week and I’d be glad to tease them out more in the comments if anyone is curious… “The True History of the Kelly Gang” I enjoyed large parts of […]

They fought the law, and everybody won.

About a Girl: A Mother's Powerful Story of Raising Her Transgender Child by Rebekah Robertson with Georgie Stone

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Rebekah and her husband were excited when they had twin boys, George and Harry, and quickly settled into family life. George knew from a very early age, however, that she was really a girl, and started going by Georgie. While Rebekah was immediately on board with Georgie’s gender identity, dad was unsure at first about how to deal with this revelation. It didn’t take him long though, to realise what was happening and to join in with supporting Georgie’s expression of herself.  Mum, dad and […]

Not as fluffy as the tv show but still a fun ride

Cocaine Blue by Kerry Greenwood

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Needing some light entertainment, I decided to rewatch Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries. It’s a delightful show and the rewatch made me curious about the books.  Phryne, carrying the cocktail, decanted it unobtrusively into a potted palm against which she had no personal grudge, and hoped that it would not give her away by dying too rapidly. Content warning: the book, and my review, mention sexual assault.  Cocaine Blues is the first book in the series. Miss Phryne Fisher is a wealthy socialite in 1920s England. […]

A Worthwhile Second Chance

I Give My Marriage A Year by Holly Wainwright

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I read and reviewed Holly Wainwright’s debut novel, The Mummy Bloggers, last year and despised it with a fiery passion. It was frothy, stereotypical, anti-feminist crap and I loathed every character and every page.  So, you can imagine my trepidation returning to the Wainwright waters for her third novel! (Her second, How To Be Perfect, was a sequel to The Mummy Bloggers so I figured I’d spare myself the rage migraines and skip it…) Before I get into the book review, a little background on […]



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