Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A re-read that holds up

My Favorite Thing is Monsters Book 1 by Emil Ferris

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Cbr16bingo Dreams graphic novel features dream sequences, nightmarish horrors and main character’s dream is to become a monster (werewolf) I reviewed this graphic novel for CBR9 and loved it. The second volume has only just dropped this year and a re-read was needed as I’d forgotten most of the plot over 7 years. This is a story of monsters and horrors, but of course the scariest things are not supernatural but very real and human. Through gorgeous detailed art and skillful storytelling, Emil Ferris creates […]

There’s Something About Mary

Mary B: A Novel by Katherine J. Chen

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Cbr16bingo fanfic  As I have mentioned in previous reviews, I love Pride and Prejudice. It’s one of my favorite novels of all time. I have read and enjoyed several re-tellings of the novel, such as Jo Baker’s Longbourn, Curtis Sittenfeld’s Eligible, and Seth Grahame-Smith’s Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. I guess those are “fanfics,” but when I think of fanfic, I think of stories like All the Young Dudes, which use a famous novel as a jump off point to imagine life beyond the original […]

A collection that has aged well

Interpreter of Maladies: Stories by Jhumpa Lahiri

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Cbr16bingo Bollywood (Bingo #1) This debut collection of short stories from Jhumpa Lahiri won a Pulitzer Prize in 2000. Interpreter of Maladies contains nine stories that deal with topics such as troubled marriages, the difficulties of adjusting to life in the US for Indian immigrants, and women who are outsiders (and therefore problematic). I found myself deeply moved by these stories which, 25 years after their first publication, provide a compassionate and brutally honest view of their characters’ lives and choices. These are people who […]

Three short novels that lack for nothing

Pale Horse, Pale Rider: Three Short Novels by Katherine Anne Porter

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Cbr16bingo Horses  This collection of three novellas- “Old Mortality, “Noon Wine” and “Pale Horse, Pale Rider”- was originally published in 1939. Each story involves characters whose illusions — about themselves and/or their families — are eventually stripped away, forcing them to face hard realities. Some are not up to it while others find the strength to move onward.  “Old Mortality” is divided into three parts and focuses on the point of view of a girl named Miranda. She and her older sister Maria are part […]

Decent spy thriller with an obvious twist

Our Woman in Moscow: A Novel by Beatriz Williams

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Cbr16bingo Detente between nations and between sisters This is a spy thriller set in WWII and the decade following, but it is built around the story of estranged twin sisters. Ruth, the outgoing striking blonde, and Iris, the quiet mousy artist, grew up in a well-to-do New York family that was brought low by the stock market crash. When their brother Harry gets a job in the US foreign service in Italy on the eve of WWII, the sisters go to live there. Ruth has […]

An important book that you’ve probably never heard of

How Do You Live? by Genzaburo Yoshino

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Cbr16bingo Vintage  This book, published in Japan in 1937, is a classic of Japanese literature and served as the inspiration for the Hayao Miyazaki film “The Boy and The Heron”. This translation by Bruno Navasky is the first time How Do You Live? has been translated into English, and it features an introduction by Neil Gaiman. Genzaburo Yoshino was born in 1899 and earned a degree in philosophy from Tokyo Imperial University. The Japan of his youth was becoming increasingly militaristic and even had “thought […]



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