Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

I feel about as prepared as this 12-year-old

Disaster Days by Rebecca Behrens

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Hannah forgot her inhaler today, again, which is annoying. But what is more annoying is that her mother continues to be overprotective and accuses her of irresponsibility anytime she forgets to bring it along. But Hannah is about to embark on her second babysitting job in their little Pelling island community, and that seems to be a good way to showcase her independence. She took the sitter course, after all, and it’s the first night she’ll watch Oscar and Zoe without their mom around.   What […]

Self-love out of self-loathing: Genesis Begins Again

Genesis Begins Again by Alicia D. Williams

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Genesis has taken hating herself to a new level: she has a long list of reasons she can’t stand herself and she’s adding to it every day. She gets help, too: from her father, who can’t help commenting in his drunken rants on how she had to end up dark like him instead of light like her beautiful mother, to the kids at school who’ve covered every cruel name for her dark skin.  Genesis has a hard time making friends anyway. Every time she starts […]

Grandparenting is the balancing act of having done it all before but having never really done it

Nanaville: Adventures in Grandparenting by Anna Quindlen

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It’s a complicated relationship, being a good grandparent, because it hinges on a series of other relationships… Because being a grandparent is determined by the relationship your child has with you, partly determined by the one a son or daughter has with his or her spouse, partly determined by the relationship you have with the person your child has chosen to have a child with. Like so many books I read I picked Nanaville: Adventures in Grandparenting off the shelves of my little town’s library […]

“I understand what you’re saying, and your comments are valuable, but I’m gonna ignore your advice.”

Fantastic Mr. Fox by Roald Dahl

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Maybe because I read it as an adult, this was only an okay reading experience for me. The only other Roald Dahl I read for the first time as an adult rather than a kid was The BFG, but I still loved that book. So maybe this is just a book that only works well for kids. Also, unlike a lot of Dahl’s books, it hasn’t aged very well. The basic gist of the plot is that Mr. Fox and his family live in a […]

L’Engle, I just wanna hug you. THANK. YOU.

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle

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Okay. Honesty time. I am trying to wrest a full cannonball from the jaws of defeat. Once I get this review written I’m at 48, I’m halfway through reading one book and 7/8 through tackling another on audio so that’s got me at 50 which is SO. CLOSE. So, I picked up Wrinkle in Time partially to get another one in the W column; however, I am hoping/trying to get my ten-year-old to read it (and the quintet) because duh, awesome. I threw the word […]

Gentle, spooky fun for sensitive, younger readers

Ghoulia and the Mysterious Visitor: Book #2 by Barbara Cantini

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While not technically about Halloween, this second Ghoulia book fits the bill for a slightly spooky story for younger readers.  My second grader loved the first book, Ghoulia: Making New Friends Can be Scary, which is about an undead girl wanting to make friends with the town children.  So when I learned that the sequel was out, it was an automatic choice for an ‘All Hallows Read’ gift. In the first book Ghoulia learned about Halloween and made friends.  This time there is a mystery […]



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