Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

crystalclear picked a good one!

Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir

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I got this cheeky book from crystalclear for the 2019 CBR Book Exchange. I had seen a few so-so reviews for it already, so I was a little worried going into it, but I enjoyed it so much! I can see why some folks didn’t wholeheartedly embrace it, but the potential pitfalls didn’t bother me at all. We are dropped into this world with little to no explanation. Gideon Nav, an orphan who was raised on a planet ruled by the Ninth House necromancers, is […]

The continuing adventures of critters you wouldn’t expect to care about

Children of Ruin by Adrian Tchaikovsky

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I was wowed by the scope of Children of Time, and it just keeps getting bigger in Children of Ruin. I was expecting a straightforward sequel, but as with the first book, all of my predictions were (delightfully!) wrong. It also covers a huge span of time, but it starts out concurrent with the first book, following a different terraforming crew. They find a couple of neighboring planets that have terraforming potential and get to work. Things go off the rails astoundingly rapidly. This is […]

Confirming that this one’s my fave

The Scar by China Mieville

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This was kind of a new experience for me. I reread old favorites all the time, but how often do you get to reread new favorites? This is the first China Mieville I ever read (reviewed in 2014!), and I have now read everything he’s written, so I started over. This one is still my favorite. The world-building is amazing. This man’s imagination is bonkers, and I’m so glad he shares it with the world. The characters are unlikeable but incredibly compelling, which is so […]

Futuristic witches should not be this bland and disappointing

The Bohr Maker by Linda Nagata

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I used to never ever give up on a book, no matter how wretched. I’m getting better at that, but I’m still learning when to give up. This one had one character interesting enough that I stuck with it, but then I was sorry I had. The story covers three characters, basically: there’s Nicco, some kind of android with a Bladerunner-like expiration date, who’s trying to get the magic doohickey (the Bohr Maker, a centuries-old, illegal software program that can basically recreate your body to […]

90% good spoiled by 10% dumb

The Visitor by Sheri S. Tepper

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I read a Sheri S. Tepper for last year’s CBR and liked but didn’t love it, and thought I’d give her another shot. I thought this one was going to change my mind. It started out with such promise! A rich, interesting, original post-apocalyptic world. Great villains. Okay heroes. Lots of interesting stuff. I was hooked! Until the end. When astronomers and scientists notice a thing out in space, heading rapidly toward Earth, they start getting nervous. When the thing avoids other planets to stay […]

Not the most Pratchetty of Pratchetts, but solid

Eric by Terry Pratchett

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A friend recommended the podcast Myths & Legends, and I chose to start with the two-part episode on Faust and Mephistopheles, because I have a sculpture of those two that I absolutely love (pictured). The episode was great, and inspired me to reread Pratchett’s Eric, which has barely anything to do with the Faust story, but is still a damn fun ride. Eric is a horny teen gothling, trying to summon a demon to grant him all his wishes. Rincewind is a terrible wizard (in that […]



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