The Ninth Hour by Alice McDermott is a delight to read. McDermott’s writing is warm and evocative, featuring vivid, relatable characters and spaces in which one longs to linger. Brooklyn and the Catholic Church of the 1920s come alive through her novel. At the same time, McDermott uses these very real people and the situations they face to challenge the reader to think about life, death, suffering and redemption. McDermott presents us with a world that we see almost exclusively from the perspective of women […]
Short and Thought-Provoking
Sum is a book that you could easily tear through in an hour or two, depending on how quickly you read and whether you take time to process what you’ve read, but I would recommend taking a little bit of time with it. I read it over the course of a few days so I could take a little time to absorb and reflect on each vignette, or at least the ones that I found most interesting or thought-provoking. Sum manages to contain a lot […]
Before and After the Fire.
This book has a lot to unpack. While reading, I noted several quotes that I thought might be useful for writing the review. Looking at them now, I made note of them because each was an amazing little bundle of sentences. Some of the bundles were laugh out loud funny. Some of the bundles were eviscerating. Some were just things most of us think, don’t say out loud, but wish some one would. Eleanor Oliphant is all of these things. She is amusing without trying […]
Ghostwriter, the pattern is full
Katie: Gentle Reader, for my fourth Cannonball (third as half of PattyKates), it is somehow fitting that our first review is a new release by none other than Kristen Ashley. It seems like an obvious choice in retrospect, but we were actually stumped about what it would be until we realized that she had recently released The Hookup, the start of her new Moonlight and Motor Oil series. Summary: Eliza is a good girl and new to Matlock, Ky. As with many of KA’s […]
Traitors, Talents, and Spies
After finishing the disappointing Half a War I was scanning my shelves and the spine of this book, emblazoned with the flag of Great Britain, jumped out at me. At the Table of Wolves by Kay Kenyon. The cover has a WWII militaristic look, with the tagline “Traitors, Talents, Spies: Let the games begin”. It had been the speculative fiction pick of the month last year at my favorite bookstore. I knew nothing about it but the store’s recommendation was enough for me. Kay Kenyon has reimagined a post […]
We need to talk about Haruki
My other possible title for this review was “Now I know how to quit you”. You see, I have a long, complicated relationship with Murakami. I read Wind-Up Bird Chronicle something like thirteen years ago. I devoured that book. It was weird and fun and compelling. And deeply unsatisfying. Much like his other books, the whole is far less than the sum of its parts. And yet, I keep reading more. I’m honestly not sure why, when there are so many books to read in this way-too-short […]
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