Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Stuff happens without much action and I am confused

The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik

by 1 Comment

BNGO review 23: Holiday Graduation is an event to celebrate. A holiday is the commemoration of a celebratory event that often includes celebrations. Thus, The Last Graduate and The Golden Enclaves qualify as holiday-themed stories. Confession: I haven’t totally finished The Last Graduate, but I had a chance to get The Golden Enclaves from the library; what my library does with new releases is they are available for shorter check out periods with no renewal option, and that deadline was approaching. Technically this is a […]

You’re a cold-hearted snake…

Be the Serpent by Seanan McGuire

by Leave a Comment

CBR14 Bingo: Series (this is book 17 in an ongoing series, do NOT start here). Could easily also have used this book for Snake and New.  Spoiler warning! This is book 17 in the series. It’s impossible to review the book without referring to events in earlier books, so if you want to remain completely unspoiled, skip this one. I’ll try to avoid any big spoilers for this book. October “Toby” Daye not only survived her wedding, but so did her husband, Tybalt, King of Cats, and all […]

“Do you know who I am yet?”

Nona the Ninth: The Locked Tomb vol. 3 by Tamsyn Muir

by 1 Comment

CBR14 Bingo: “Question” – Figuring out Nona’s identity is a core element of the book. This is a spoiler free review.  I am so glad to have made the decision to throw my reading plans out the window and reread Gideon the Ninth and Harrow the Ninth  before reading Nona the Ninth.  Having everything fresh in my mind was helpful because once again Muir throws the reader into the deep end of the pool, expecting one to keep afloat until things gel together. Nona is unlike […]

matrimony, murder, and black market mischief in post-war London

The Right Sort of Man by Allison Montclair

by Leave a Comment

CBR Bingo: Series (Sparks & Bainbridge Mysteries #1) I needed some new, lighter mysteries to get me through the dwindling days of early autumn. This popped up in my library recommendations, and since there’s a few of them to work through, I figured I’d give it a try. While there’s no shortage of books set during WWII, there are fewer that actually work through the aftermath of the war, which is its own very distinctive setting. The war is over and won, but London is still in tatters […]

A Satisfying Conclusion (For Now…)

King of Scars by Leigh Bardugo

Rule of Wolves by Leigh Bardugo

by Leave a Comment

After watching the Shadow and Bone series on Netflix, 2022 became the year of Leigh Bardugo for me – and although I didn’t connect equally to all of her work, overall I’ve very much enjoyed this adventure. I started out with the original Shadow and Bone trilogy, then moved on to the Six of Crows duology, took a brief detour to read the first of the Alex Stern Series, and now I’ve rounded out the year with the King of Scars duology.  For me, these […]

Personal Essays on Horror, from a Queer Angle

It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror by Joe Vallese (editor)

by 5 Comments

When I saw that It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror came out this month I headed immediately to my library catalog to request it and then proceeded to consume it over three evenings. By and large this is an excellent collection of essays featuring queer authors of many stripes taking a movie, sometimes two, and either pulling them apart to discuss representation, or explain why they became fixated on a certain film, or how a film can help them process part of […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo