Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“You don’t know how many forks I’m packing.”

The Devil You Know by Kit Rocha

by Leave a Comment

CBR13Bingo: Rep – Maya has several sensitivity triggers, including certain noises and textures I’m a longtime Kit Rocha reader, so of course I was beyond excited to see the next book in the Mercenary Librarians series. I went in expecting lots of found family goodness, steamy scenes and maybe a little murder-by-fork. And, oh boy, did I ever love this book! As a warning, this is the second in the series, so there will be spoilers for the first book. It’s basically super soldier Brady […]

An extraordinary life, ordinarily told

Confessions of an Art Addict by Peggy Guggenheim

by Leave a Comment

Bingo: book club Though the Guggenheim name is well-known, I had never heard of Peggy Guggenheim, but when it came up as my work book club’s next pick, I was intrigued. An heiress to (today’s equivalent of) millions of dollars, she had a cushy childhood before deciding to devote herself to supporting and collecting art. She lived in England, France, Italy and America, and visited many more places in her never-ending quest to expand her art collections. This memoir is a very entertaining read, as […]

I almost gave up on my white whale 100 times…

The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner

by 2 Comments

Bingo: white whale (plus another bingo: ring) CW: racism, misogyny, castration, cruelty I think there is a good reason that ‘classic’ literature, the kind we’re taught in school, is made up of a lot of white whales. When a book is held up as an example, as a work that has near-universal things to teach us, it takes away some of the enjoyment, as it adds an element of work. We’re not supposed to simply enjoy it, we’re supposed to take something away from it. […]

Vicious Vixens

The Corpse Wore Pasties by Johnny Porkpie

by Leave a Comment

Read as part of CBR13Bingo: Shelfie. Posted is a picture of the book with other Hard Case Crime books I collect. This one’s Hard Case Crime book is one that I’ve been meaning to get to for some time. It almost qualified as my “white whale” for bingo but I decided to stick it here instead to show off part of my Hard Case Crime collection. And while I didn’t think it was as good as other HCC tales, I wish the label would put […]

I did not see that coming

Sea Witch by Sarah Henning

by 2 Comments

CBR Bingo: Book Club (Cannon Book Club selection) In 1989, I was 7 years old. I wasn’t the kind of little girl who loved princesses, but like almost any other kid my age, I loved The Little Mermaid. I have no idea how many times I’ve seen it, but I know most of it by heart. I remember learning to play “Under the Sea” in 7th grade band (I also learned Aladdin’s “A Whole New World” in American Sign Language in 5th grade choir, but that’s a […]

Gateway to Science Fiction and Octavia Butler

Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler

by Leave a Comment

Cbr13bingo Gateway, Bingo #9-11 (horizontal, vertical and inner square) Parable of the Sower (1993) is an astoundingly prescient work of science fiction. Octavia Butler (1947-2006), winner of Nebula, Hugo and MacArthur prizes, tells the story of hyperempath Lauren Olamina in mid-2020s California. I reviewed this novel for the 2015 Cannonball Read, and I do believe that it (or really any written by Butler) would be a Gateway to reading more sci-fi/fantasy, and I hope a Gateway to reading more by Butler. Butler writes powerfully and […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo