domestic violence – Cannonball Read 17

That which we call a rose

The Names by Florence Knapp

September 8, 2025 by Jen K Leave a Comment

I’m a sucker for a Sliding Doors kind of story – Lionel Shriver’s The Post Birthday World, Kristin Cashore Jane, Unlimited … – I just enjoy seeing how the author envisions people having completely different relationships based on one decision. Sometimes, there is a sense of poignancy and sadness as a reader as we know things the characters never will, we see how people that could have been best friends in one life are barely passing strangers, seeing a loss the characters never even realize […]

“You can bid your parents farewell without forgiving them. You don’t have to love them.”

A Life Turned Upside Down: My Dad's an Alcoholic by Mariko Kikuchi

July 11, 2022 by GentleRain 1 Comment

The translation of autobiographical manga has been a wonderful side effect of the overall boom in popularity of manga/anime. The original manga boom in the early 2000s overlooked memoir, but as the market has matured and the comics boom has entered a new phase, memoir is finally being translated in the US, which is a real treat for me. A Life Turned Upside Down is a very sad and graphic memoir that explores the impact of having an alcoholic father, especially when everyone around the child […]

Someone’s Listening…

Someone's Listening by Seraphina Nova Glass

June 21, 2021 by msvreadsbooks Leave a Comment

I read this in a flurry with several other “domestic suspense” novels, so, admittedly, I had to refresh my memory. When I read the synopsis, I remembered that this one has a slightly different angle than some others, but it doesn’t stand out in my memory that strongly. This could be more due to the fact that I read SEVERAL domestic thrillers in the course of a few weeks, and it’s now becoming much easier to predict what’s going on. Or it could be that […]

Generic title, author name and book.. but it was fine

The Other Woman by Sandie Jones

May 12, 2021 by caragwapa Leave a Comment

It has been around two weeks since I’ve finished this book and frankly, its taking me some time to conjure up details of the book. Not to say that it’s bad, maybe just a bit generic? I’m sure I’ve read a lot of psychological thrillers like this. You know that ones where the bad guy could be anyone, and there is definitely a *SPOILER ALERT* big twist or some misunderstanding. This one book just hangs along the with the rest of them and does not […]

Memory and trauma and loss and family

Memorial Drive by Natasha Trethewey

January 14, 2021 by zinka Leave a Comment

Memorial Drive, by Natasha Trethewey, is a memoir where Trethewey tells the stories of her childhood homes, growing up as a child of a black mother and white father, the shift in her relationship to her mother, and, eventually, her mother’s murder while Trethewey was still a young woman. This is the core of the book, but it really is so much more than that. A relatively short read, Memorial Drive is captivating and visceral. At its length, I would have expected to read the […]

“He breathed in my face the coffee he’d just drunk, mingled with the odor of his gums.”

A Girl Returned by Donatella Di Pietrantonio

August 10, 2020 by andtheIToldYouSos Leave a Comment

1970s Naples: a thirteen year old girl of privilege is suddenly removed from her seaside home and returned to a cramped and dirty apartment outside the city. The key word here is “returned”; our heroine has been sent “home” to a place that she never knew. She spent her entire life living with her glamorous mother and policeman father, only to have that reality shattered in one afternoon when the man she knew as her father bundles her and all of her belongings into the […]

Zirza on A Gothic Classic for a ReasonIt's one of those wish-you-could-read-it-again-for-the-first-time books. I loved it.
Emmalita on “It came to something when you found yourself hoping that the footsteps you heard were ghosts.”I loved the ending! I don’t think it’s been out long enough to talk about why though.
Dixie on Track Her Down by Melinda LeighI am just starting Track Her Down and I have read them all in order till now and thought I...
Roland of Gilead on How can you give us the gift of a crazy character named Rando Thoughtful and then just as suddenly take that gift away? We need to talk, Uncle Stevie.I came across this randomly years after it was written because I was searching "Random Thoughtful. But I have the...
Emmalita on “Only you, Em, would refer to heartbreak as a distraction. I think I would have a more sympathetic response if I asked to marry a bookcase.”Oh my goodness, Gallifrey was beautiful. I’m sure her mittens were gloriously murdery.

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