Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

You learn your lessons and stay vigilant, or you die

A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik

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4.5 stars Official book description: A Deadly Education is set at Scholomance, a school for the magically gifted where failure means certain death (for real) — until one girl, El, begins to unlock its many secrets. There are no teachers, no holidays, and no friendships, save strategic ones. Survival is more important than any letter grade, for the school won’t allow its students to leave until they graduate… or die!    The rules are deceptively simple: Don’t walk the halls alone. And beware of the […]

Thanks, Beth O’Leary, for making 2020 a little less cruddy.

The Flatshare by Beth O'Leary

The Switch by Beth O'Leary

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My 2020 was all about comfort reading. I bought a bunch of well-received mysteries and horror novels and then, when I started reading them, I just couldn’t deal. My brain wasn’t up for anything that wasn’t a happy ending. So I’m glad I discovered Beth O’Leary. Last year around this time, I was in London, and I saw ads for The Flatshare in all of the tube stations and at all of the bookstores. Not knowing anything about it, I bought it, threw it in […]

A whole lot of fighting happens

Battle Ground by Jim Butcher

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Spoiler warning! This is book 17 in a long, ongoing series. This really isn’t the place to start. In fact, this book doesn’t even work on its own, so don’t even think to read this review if you’re not caught up. Normally, I’d recommend that you start with book 1, but the first three books of The Dresden Files are pretty bad, so you’d be better off starting with book 4, Summer Knight. I highly recommend the audio books, narrated by James Marsters. They’re what finally sold […]

Did not expect to love a book about zombies

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks

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4.5 stars Official book description: The Zombie War came unthinkably close to eradicating humanity. Max Brooks, driven by the urgency of preserving the acid-etched first-hand experiences of the survivors from those apocalyptic years, traveled across the United States of America and throughout the world, from decimated cities that once teemed with upwards of thirty million souls to the most remote and inhospitable areas of the planet. He recorded the testimony of men, women, and sometimes children who came face-to-face with the living, or at least […]

Mix tape of memories

Almost a Mirror by Kirsten Krauth

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Jimmy started making a mix tape for Mona for her 15th birthday, a blend of the pretty boy pop she liked and his edgier preferences.  The song titles of that slice of the 80s head the short chapters of this arty debut novel that jump Mona back and forward in time from the starstruck girl she was to the woman she has become. There’s a Spotify list if you want to listen along as you read. But I didn’t need to.  The musical cues dragged […]

Adorable child or annoying brat? You decide!

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley

The Weed that Strings the Hangman's Bag by Alan Bradley

A Red Herring without Mustard by Alan Bradley

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Someone on the Cannonball Read book chat asked recently for recommendations for when you just can’t focus due to various life stressors. Having gone through a similar phase myself, I recommended cozy mysteries as the genre I find easy to read when I can’t concentrate on much else. I picked up The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie when I was in Pennsylvania on a family emergency, and I decided to go ahead and read the next couple in the series (#2 The Weed […]



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