Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Singing the Heartsong

The Stone Key by Isobelle Carmody

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Oh-ho, this is how you know I am starting to procrastinate this weekend! I’m going for two reviews in two days! When I first picked up this book, it had been eight years since I had read the previous four. I was no longer in high school but rather ready to start my Master’s degree. And to be honest, over the nine-year break, I had nearly forgotten the series. If I hadn’t noticed The Stone Key on the shelves after bumming around in a book […]

OhWeGone

A History of Wild Places by Shea Ernshaw

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Read as part of CBR16 Bingo: cult. There is a commune at the center of this book that may-or-may-not be a cult. You’ll have to read to find out! An interesting book that’s tough to rate but I’m glad I read it. Also glad for Book Bingos, Reading and Library Challenges that get me to get stuff off of my shelves that would otherwise sit there for years. Shea Ernshaw has real talent. I was drawn into the world she wrote; being quite impressed with […]

“…superheroes, for all their good PR, were terrible for the world.”

Hench: A Novel by Natalie Zina Walschots

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Cbr16bingo cult Anna is good at crunching numbers and analysis, and she puts those skills to work as a henchman for any villain looking for help. But times are tough. She had had a pretty good gig going, but the thing about henching is that eventually superheroes destroy lairs, and that means layoffs. Anna along with her friends June and Greg find themselves back at the temp agency (there is a temp agency just for henchmen) desperate for some job, any job, that will pay […]

An interesting premise, but not one I cared about enough to continue

Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez

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Did not finish It is 1981 in Buenos Aires. Juan and his young son Gaspar embark on a cross-country trip to his late wife’s family compound. It is clear from the beginning that Juan is ill and is still suffering the after-effects of recent heart surgery and the sudden loss of his wife Rosario. This is no ordinary road trip. He is struggling to support his son, who does not understand what is really happening and is traumatized by his mother’s death and his father’s […]

Horror Month 2023: #3

Last Days by Adam Nevill

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This is a book that shouldn’t have worked for me. There’s little characterization and what is there made the MC come off as an insufferable prig. The book follows a formula of the film crew going to one location, talking to someone attached to the cult, being spooked out by the house on location…and then moving on and doing the same thing over-and-over. The scares themselves are of that jumpscare variety that’s never been my kind of horror. And it takes 531 pages to get […]

“I’m still going to move them out of my wanigan, but I’ll give you odds two-to-one that after they move out there’s going to be spontaneous combustion.”

Pilgrim's Wilderness: A True Story of Faith and Madness on the Alaska Frontier by Tom Kizzia

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The Pilgrim family seems to be a lovable, if eccentric addition to the town of McCarthy, Alaska, and soon win many supporters for their battle for landowner rights with the National Park Service. But the head of the clan is keeping some secrets, and the family’s lifestyle is not as idyllic as it seems. Having lived in bustling cities all my life, life in remote Alaska has always sounded surreal to me – and so I’ve often thought about how it would go if I […]



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