Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A teenage wizard girl and her somewhat sentient cookie and sourdough do big stuff

A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking by T. Kingfisher

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I was a little late to the A Wizard’s Guide to Defensive Baking, but I’m glad I finally got it; this one is both fun and a little inventive. The basic story is plucky heroine with limited resources faces off against unknown and then known end-of-the-world kind of badness, and triumphs with the help of some friends. Said heroine is 14-year-old Mona, who lives as a magic user in a world mostly suspicious of magic. Mona’s magic only works on baked goods, which is just […]

There is beauty to be found in the melting snow and McDonalds wrappers

Little Foxes Took Up Matches by Katya Kazbek

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Mitya is not good at math, as you can see. But he’s good at imagination. Mitya is utterly convinced that no one has ever looked at two halves long enough, or attentively enough. Mitya has some stories for you. Much like Mitya himself, this novel contains multitudes. Katya Kazbek, who often works as a translator, holds the door open for the curious reader with snippets of fairy tales. Sometimes these tales are her takes on mythology, and sometimes they are the mythology of being a […]

once again: great book, TERRIBLE cover

The Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante

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The cover is even WORSE this time- not only do we have another DIY looking illustration,  but the featured pull quote from The Australian‘s John Freeman is ABYSMAL: “Imagine if Jane Austen got angry and you’ll have some idea of how explosive these works are.” Fuck right off, guy. Emphasis on GUY. Just because Austen characters aren’t slapping and cussing each other out does not mean that they aren’t also filled with the contained rage of being a woman trapped in position- a woman who will do […]

A Kafna, a Kokwa, a Kadoh, and a Kokopah walk into a classroom and I don’t know what all this means

Magus of the Library vol 4 by Mitsu izumi

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I saw a cartoon a long time ago (XKCD I suspect) that suggested that the more made-up terminology a fantasy story had, the more suspicious of quality it might be. Magus of the Library (vol. 4) is a partial example behind why this might be so; what’s being set up is actually interesting and I like the world so far, but since it’s been a while since I’ve read volume 3, there are quite a few technical terms about the fantasy world that I don’t […]

The cowboys are Librarians who work with more than books

Upright Women Wanted by Sarah Gailey

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Upright Women Wanted has a really interesting set-up: take your standard Western setting, and instead of cowboys, substitute a group of women called Librarians, whose supposed job is to delivery Approved Materials for reading and pick up the old or worn out materials for fixing up. Esther wants to join the Librarians to get away from her past and she stows away in a Librarian wagon. Obviously she gets caught and reaches a tentative agreement with the Head Librarian Bet about apprenticing. The novella follows […]

If you like lots of angst in your YA and stories about teenagers being assholes and doing stupid things, you will like this more than I did.

May the Best Man Win by Z.R. Ellor

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I was disappointed by this one, I don’t think through any fault of the book. I was really looking forward to it because of the premise, but it wasn’t really to my tastes, though I think what the author did with it was interesting. It just didn’t resonate with me. So what we’ve got here is two exes both running for homecoming king. Jeremy is trans (and newly out) and a cheerleader, and Lukas is the boyfriend dumped over the summer. They used to be […]



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