Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

An epic (ha) recommendation

Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips

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Mythic: definitely a twist on [Orpheus / Eurydice] within the pantheon of the Grecian God myths! Hmmm as I periodically think, I wish Goodreads let you give book half star ratings because this definitely positively falls under a 3.5 star rating. I think I wasn’t as into this as I thought I would be given the blurb, and then towards the end I was very into it and pretty shocked to find out that I only had about half an hour left–not because I thought […]

A very cool pantheon of gods ruined by lackluster writing and anti-Semitism

Wicked Saints by Emily A. Duncan

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BINGO – NEW SERIES Originally published in 2019, Wicked Saints is the first novel in a young adult, fantasy series that follows a young cleric named Nadya from a downtrodden land Kalyazi. She is able to commune with the entire pantheon of gods and petition them for assistance and magic. The people of Kalyazi are in a century-long war against Tranavia primarily led by a young mage named Serefin who is also the prince of Tranavia. The people of Tranavia reject the gods and instead […]

“The women save themselves.”

What If You & Me by Roni Loren

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New Series: The first book in the series came out March 2021 Grumpy/sunshine is a favorite trope of mine, so I was very excited to read this newest book by Roni Loren, and I wasn’t disappointed. It’s also a fascinating take on that trope: while Andi is extroverted and optimistic, she’s not without her own troubles, and I loved how in some ways she’s less sunshine-y than her “grumpy werewolf” neighbor. This is the second in the series but can easily be read as a standalone. […]

Perfectly serviceable humorous memoir about someone who seems to have his head on straight despite ingesting a truly scary amount of drugs

Yearbook by Seth Rogen

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Gateway: into one of the only non-fiction genres I read, “memoirs written by comedic writers.” This is a great one to start with, seeing as how there’s more understanding and context to Rogen’s adventures than some of the older memoirs that might not have aged 100% well. For example, I appreciate very much that Rogen prefaces some of his drug escapades with the disclaimer that he gets away with stuff because he is a white man. So ymmv but for me this book was 50% […]

The cover of this book is as gorgeous as the writing inside it

Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender

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They She He: what else could this book be?! Our main character, Felix, is a transgender [boy] of 17 who is figuring out his gender identity while figuring out who’s the transphobic prick in his school while figuring out how to get a boyfriend I’m surprised by how much I liked this book! Which is because usually stories about teenagers + love make me side eye just a little–I’m sorry I’m sorry! It’s just the way it is, I am just a bit cynical. For example, I […]

Watch Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet instead

Incense and Sensibility by Sonali Dev

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Flora: there’s two lotus flowers on the cover of this book, which made me realize that the main heroine’s hair was short the entire time–not super common for romance novels, will give it that! I do not understand why I keep reading these books, I clearly do not like them. And every time I read them I get grumpy that this is likely The Indian Retelling of Jane Austen’s oeuvre, at least for a number of years. You don’t see Jane Austen and Werewolves anywhere, […]



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