Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

World of Tents, one pebble and a special friendship

Lubna and the Pebble by Wendy Meddour

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#cbr11bingo #farandaway Lubna and the Pebble is a tiny bit romantic, but it is a lovely story about a special friendship that grows into a second special friendship that turns into a third special friendship. Lubna is a refugee child living in the World of Tents. She, her father and brothers, live in uncertain times, so when Lubna finds a rock, she makes it her special friend. One that she tells all her secrets too. One that gives her comfort when there is little around. […]

An Unflinching Historical YA Fiction of 1969 Malaysia

The Weight of Our Sky by Hanna Alkaf

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CBR11 Bingo Square: Youths! This book was on the featured wall of the Young Adult section of our library, and the cover art immediately drew me in. Although written as a YA novel with a teenage protagonist, this novel specifically includes an author’s note at the beginning warning for content including racism, graphic violence, death, OCD and anxiety triggers. Suffice to say, this is a heavy book based on the real events of the 1969 race riots in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, albeit about a fictional […]

Either shorten it or split it

The Lions of Al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay

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I read Guy Gavriel Kay’s Sailing to Sarantium and its sequel last year (or maybe the year before) and thoroughly enjoyed them. So much fantasy feels so very centered on western European culture and histories and Kay breaks the mold a little bit with some very Ottoman-inspired fantasy. The Lions of Al-Rassan, which I was very much looking forward to, was similar in that respect, I just wish it had been trimmed down, or possibly split across two books. This is a sprawling fantasy story covering multiple […]

An unattended wound gets infected

There There by Tommy Orange

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CBR11 BINGO: Own Voices and HALF CANNONBALL! There are so many books out there that could easily be great candidates for the CBR Bingo “Own Voices” square. As a white, female reader, I know that I tend to gravitate towards novels about and by white, and often female, authors. I don’t have to scroll through my GoodReads to know that. While I do read across a wide range of genres, I am trying to make more of an effort to seek out books by other […]

(Bingo: Pajiba) All shall fade into the whiteness of death

Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James

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I was keenly intrigued upon reading both the Pajiba post about this one and I think also possibly Big Idea on Scalzi’s website but I’m not certain about that. I just know I saw a fair amount of press and was very interested in reading James’ take on an epic fantasy world beginning from an African perspective. “Children cannot help how they are born, they had no choice in it. Choosing to be a fool, though . . .” (Kindle loc 1020) Unfortunately, I am […]

Hold on tight to your dreams

The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline

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Cbr11bingo Own voices Author Cherie Dimaline is a Canadian Metis writer, that is, her heritage is a mix of Indigenous American and European. In The Marrow Thieves, she imagines a grim future where environmental disasters, both man-made and natural, and disease have broken the Earth and most of its people. Government, science and religious leaders turn to Indigenous people for survival, but not in a way that involves respect and collaboration. As they have done throughout history, they aim to take something vitally important from […]



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