Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

There is nothing Shakespeare didn’t anticipate.

Booth by Karen Joy Fowler

by Leave a Comment

CBR14 BINGO: Gaslight Square (BINGO! Bodies to Gaslight BINGO! Snake to Gaslight) (For the literal: Takes place in the mid-19th century when gaslight was used. Figuratively: everyone gaslights each other in this one. Full of manipulative spouses, parents, siblings, neighbors, friends, and politicians.) Decades ago I was well into an American Civil War historical fiction rabbit hole. I read a lot of it. In that pile of reading, there was quite a bit about John Wilkes Booth whether he was the main character or part of a subplot. All […]

“I, Penelope Taberner Cameron, tell this story of happenings when I was a young girl.”

A Traveller in Time by Alison Uttley

by Leave a Comment

CBRBingo14: Time (time traveling) I think this is one of those books that is a children’s classic in England but didn’t become as famous in the US, or else I just missed it as a kid. I picked it up on vacation in England recently along with two other children’s time travel novels, which seems to be a lively genre over there. A Traveller in Time is a book that’s very centered in one place, in this case the farm of Thackers. Uttley is wonderful […]

Gruesome and Grotesque but also Wow!

The Wolf and the Watchman: 1793: A Novel by Niklas Natt och Dag

by 5 Comments

Cannonball! I think I was only able to finish this novel, which really is extraordinary, by cheating on it with The House in the Cerulean Sea. I tend to be “monolibrous” — I word I am coining to mean one who does not start a new novel until having finished the one they’re already reading. The Wolf and the Watchman was so intense, and so gritty and disturbing, that I had to take breaks from it. It is to the credit of Swedish author Niklas Natt […]

“What is a game?” Marx said. “It’s tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. It’s the possibility of infinite rebirth, infinite redemption. The idea that if you keep playing, you could win. No loss is permanent, because nothing is permanent, ever.”

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

by 2 Comments

If this doesn’t make my top ten books of the year, I’ll eat something inedible. My cat does it all the time, how hard can it be? This book sucked my entire being into it while I was reading it, and I was a brainless husk just turning pages while my brain was flopping around in there having a grand old time. Sorry if that sounds gross but that’s what happened! I can’t change the facts! This is a book about friendship, love, and video […]

Forevermore

The Pale Blue Eye by Louis Bayard

by Leave a Comment

Read as part of cbr14bingo: gaslight. This book took place in gaslight era New York state. There’s even a gaslight on the book cover!  Most of the time, I ditch the vaunted 5th star from an otherwise excellent book due to the ending. I’m usually disappointed by endings and even if I try to be graceful, I still can sometimes get disappointed by one. I can’t recall ever bumping a book from four stars to five due to the ending, yet here we are. I’m not […]

The Best is Back

Carrie Soto is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid

by 2 Comments

Read this as part of CBR14bingo: question. I wanted to know who Carrie Soto is and what she is coming back from. Later, I wanted another question answered… I was at a bookstore about a month ago when I heard two people gabbing about Taylor Jenkins Reid’s new book, Carrie Soto Is Back. One began with, “I just finished the book…” and instead of the platitudes I expected, she continued “and I hated it. The lead character was terrible there was nothing else to go on after […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo