Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“I’m looking for truth. Je church la vé·ri·té”

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein

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CBR 14 BINGO: Shadow, because it deals with shedding light on the truth, which is not always what it seems Code Name Verity has been sitting patiently on my TBR for close to 10 years (having first been published in 2012). I snatched it out of a Little Free Library and thought it would be the perfect entry for the Shadow category in this year’s bingo. Reviewing this novel without giving away any spoilers is a little difficult, but not impossible if I focus on […]

“My dear chap, this is a bookshop. There’s never anywhere better to be.”

Slippery Creatures by K.J. Charles

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CBR14 Bingo: Snake (SPOILER: being a thoroughly disreputable sort, Kim also turns out to betray Will at least once during the story) Will Darling has inherited his late uncle’s bookshop and is grateful for the fact. After serving in World War I, most of his skills involve killing swiftly and efficiently, not really a commodity on the post-war job markets back in England. Now he just needs to get some idea of all the books actually in the shop and get on with being a […]

Now that I’m older I know that life is not about what keeps you safe, but what you keep safe, and that’s what matters most.

Beasts of a Little Land by Juhea Kim

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CBR14 BINGO: Heart Square (And so begins one of my favorite times of the year: CBR Bingo! This is a literal “heart” square filler as every character with a heart has it broken.) I wanted to like this one more than I did. It is a beautifully written novel about love that somehow lacks warmth. In a weird way, it reminded me of the Elena Ferrante’s Neopolitan novels. I loved those books but was always haunted by the coldness of them. This book has a casual cruelness to […]

Fires being stoked, both literal and figurative.

The Fatal Flame (Timothy Wilde, #3) by Lyndsay Faye

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I had this book out from the library so long they charged me for a replacement, and then I ended up buying a used copy anyway (I did return the library book, which was an Interlibrary Loan, whoops). Should have just done that from the beginning! Oh, well. I would have bought it eventually anyway, because this is a really good series and I will be revisiting it some time in the future, and also I have to complete my Lyndsay Faye book collection (gotta […]

“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.”

West with Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge

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West with Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge is a charming historical fiction. It is the coming of age story of “Woody Nickel”, a Dust Bowl orphan from the Texas Panhandle who travels cross country with a pair of giraffes. Rutledge, while researching a book on the San Diego Zoo, learned about two giraffes who arrived in NYC on a boat that barely survived the extremely destructive 1938 Long Island hurricane. The giraffes then traveled cross country to their new home at the San Diego Zoo. Using […]

My thoughts, two months later.

Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo

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. . . which are not many. I’ve honestly been wanting to read one of Malinda Lo’s books for years now, but never got around to it. After having finally done so, now I’m not sure if I’ll be reading more . . . maybe the queer Cinderella retelling (Ash, I think?). This was well-written and I liked it, and the premise is well-thought out and a bunch of other complimentary things . . . but this was just a good read for me, not […]



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