Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“Guts” delivers and important message to younger readers about mind/body connection

Guts by Raina Telgemeier

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Raina Telgemeier returns to the autobiographical in Guts.  I’m late to the party on this book as my 13 and 9 year old have read it multiple times since its release in 2019.  For those familiar with Telgemeier’s autobiographical graphic novels, this is a story in which Raina is younger than in Smile or Sisters.  She’s in fifth grade and has begun having stomach troubles.  It started with a round of stomach flu going through her family and school.  But afterward Raina begins to obsess about the […]

Middle Earth or New Zealand for this BINGO square; it’s a toss up. #CBRBingo – I Wish

The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

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“You are a very fine person, Mr. Baggins, and I am very fond of you; but you are only quite a little fellow in a wide world after all!” I have always wanted to go to Middle Earth. Well, I say always, but I actually came to The Hobbit a little late (and The Lord of the Rings later than that). It was required reading for freshman year English class in my high school. I was absolutely enchanted by it, especially the “Riddles in the […]

Magical Friendship: cbr12bingo – “Friendship”

Phoebe and Her Unicorn in The Magic Storm by Dana Simpson

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“Phoebe and Her Unicorn” began as a web comic by Dana Simpson in 2012 and then a few years later became a syndicated comic strip in newspapers, that is still in active publication.  The first five books in the series are compilations of those comics.  Phoebe and Her Unicorn in The Magic Storm is the first standalone graphic novel. Phoebe is an average girl who befriends a unicorn, Marigold Heavenly Nostrils.  Together they tackle the mundane, school, to adventure, like when they solve mysteries as the […]

I finally understand the struggle of non-English speakers who have to wait for books to be translated

Ghostsitter - A Crazy Inheritance by Tommy Krapweiss

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Okay, so this series is originally written in German. The first one was translated into English in an Audible Original (but not the other 7) and they made no attempt to Americanize it!  Hooray!  (They also never explicitly say they’re in Germany, which may have helped clear up some confusion in the beginning.)   Fourteen-year-old Tom is living his normal life with his adopted grandma when one day they get a notice that his great-uncle Heinrich has died, and Tom needs to attend the will […]

Winnie the Pooh was inspired by a real bear named Winnie: cbr12 bingo “The Roaring 20’s”

Finding Winnie: The True Story of the World's Most Famous Bear by Lindsay Mattick, Sophie Blackall (artist)

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Earlier in bingo, I learned that Winnie the Pooh was published in 1926 and so counted for “The Roaring 20’s”.  I went looking through my library to discover that we don’t have a copy (though we have the entire Paddington collection).  However, Grandma had sent this book to my kids! Finding Winnie opens with a mother (the author) telling her son a true story about a bear.  Winnie’s story begins in Winnipeg, Canada with a young veterinarian named Harry Colbourn.  Harry specialized in treating horses and […]

The garden itself isn’t magic, positive thinking and determination are what brings the change: cbr12 bingo “Green”

The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, illustrated by Tasha Tudor

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I did not intend for The Secret Garden to  be my “Green” book for Cannonball bingo but when I finished reading it to my 8 year old last night, it seemed silly to not take advantage of it fitting the green square.  This is my beloved copy from childhood.  I can’t recall how many times it has been read over the years and with this re-read it has now been shared with both my children.  The Secret Garden captured my imagination as a child with its […]



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