Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Palaces for the People

Palaces for the People by Eric Klinenberg

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I really, really wanted to love this book. Nobody loves libraries more than I do and this book is supposed to be a strong argument for supporting public libraries. I wanted to read and love this book and recommend it to everybody who doesn’t support their local library. The book discusses the importance of social infrastructure, those things like parks and libraries that bring neighbors together. Klinenberg argues that social infrastructure is what makes people survive in times of crisis (like the big Chicago heat […]

“The world is available to us, but that may be the problem.”

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I was a little nervous to read this, despite my love for Aziz Ansari (and I do love him — I am the biggest Parks & Rec fan and he’s the greatest on there), because while I’m (fairly) young, I’ve been married for almost 11 years and never really had to deal with dating in a modern age. I met my husband when I was in high school (we worked together) and got married a year after I graduated. I know I remember texting being around then, […]

Not another celebrity biography at all

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My experience with Aziz Ansari prior to getting this audiobook was as follows. Playing exuberant, outgoing and quite exasperating pop culture and fashion obsessive Tom Haverford on Parks and Recreation, then more recently in Master of None as struggling New York actor Dev, who while quite different from Tom, frequently exasperated me nonetheless with his constant whining and inability to accept how good he had it, being really very privileged even as a minority actor. As a result, I wasn’t really all that interested in […]

How to use food rakes online. And other social media insights on love.

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When I heard that Aziz Ansari was coming out with a book, I placed a hold in my library catalog IMMEDIATELY. And then I waited FOREVER. I heard during the wait that Modern Romance was not a memoir but an exploration of love and social media. I was intrigued. I mean, there was no way I was not going to read this book. I love me some Aziz, particularly because I love his interpretation of Tom Haverford. So in honor of this auspicious character, Tom […]

I KNEW IT! Heat is bad, and I’m not crazy for liking winter.

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I heard about Eric Klinenberg’s book Heat Wave: A Social Autopsy of Disaster in Chicago last month when fellow Cannonballer Lollygagger gave it a favorable review. I’ve been reading up on various memoirs and nonfiction accounts of disasters and other dystopian elements in our world, and this book seemed to fit the bill. Also, as someone who has lived outside Chicago for the last four years, I was interested in the contemporary history aspect of the book. My sister is currently in paramedic school in […]

Modern romance is more than just dick pics and straight white boys texting “hey” 15 times straight

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This was an enjoyable book, even if I am still a bit baffled by it and can’t figure out if it was a 3 star or a 4 star read. It’s half comedian/actor memoir and half pop sociology in the vein of a Freakanomics or Malcolm Gladwell book. Ansari didn’t want to write just another celebrity memoir and he was fascinated by the new ways technology is influencing society’s love lives, so he teamed up with NYU sociologist Eric Klinenberg. Together they took on a […]



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