Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Friendship can be found in the strangest of places

Little Robot by Ben Hatke

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Ben Hatke works his magic again!  He creates a beautiful story with only a few words, and most of those are sound effects! A little girl (she doesn’t have a name) finds an abandoned robot, and he becomes her friend.  It’s her only friend, as it turns out. I’m pretty sure she’s young, too young to go to school, and spends her days escaping her trailer park home and exploring the local junkyard. (We get all of this in about eight pages and absolutely no […]

All you need is a sweet dragon friend, a flower and a little spunk to get you through the day

Rosie and Rasmus by Serena Geddes

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Rosie and Rasmus is a classically feeling book with modern language. Serena Geddes’s story is straight forward (a girl wishes she had a friend but is too shy to go play with the others and the other children never see her just standing off to the side). But when she wanders off and meets a dragon named Rasmus, she has a grand time playing, having adventures and learning a big lesson. The part that can help you interact with the book is one can use […]

Once Upon a time a baby named Tess was adopted….

Giant Tess by Dan Yaccarino

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Dan Yaccarino is known for a quirky style, but usually good, solid stories.  This time, Giant Tess combines classic Yaccarino and an old school flair to create a modern fairy tale. Which, unfortunately, is an obvious story that has been done before. It is a case of “Be yourself and anyone of any size can be a hero.” Tess, adopted as a baby, grows so quickly there is no denying it, she is a giant. And that, as one can assume, does not always work […]

Get your head out of the clouds and gaze at this!

Stargazing by Jen Wang

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Stargazing by Jen Wang is not only less controversial than other graphic novels from this publisher (which deal with issues such as transgender, being gay, and bullying) it is less controversial than their other book, Prince and the Dressmaker (known as PATD from now on). In fact, until I read the other books Wang has done, I did not realize PATD was theirs. Once you see that, there are style similarities to Wang’s illustrations, but that where similarities end. The voices of both graphic novels […]

Welcome to your Feelings

The Happy Book by Andy Rash

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The Happy Book is very simple. The reader goes about exploring feelings via different “books” within the main story. The end. However, it is a smidgen more complicated that than. There are numerous puns (one narrator is Happy Camper, and yes, he is happy and an old school Boy Scout camper; the other is Happy Clam who is happy and well, a clam) the art of the illustrations has to be closely watched as there are details in the story’s art and  text (plus fun […]

Rock-a-bye friends in the tree-house top

The Tallest Tree House by Elly MacKay

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The Tallest Tree House by Elly MacKay is one of those books where what you put into it is what you take out of it. You will either really like it, or be “eh, that’s nice.” The Tallest Tree House is a sweet story about friendship and the theme of “a place and time for everything.” And the time to build a tree house is now. But two friends have unique ways of going about making one. One plans and the other rushes about without […]



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