Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A Woman is a Mule, or “What’s in that trunk, Adelaide?”, or a Novel of Second Chances

Lone Women by Victor LaValle

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I met Victor LaValle at a literary fest a few years ago. While handing him a copy of The Changeling, which was his latest novel at the time and the book I had just finished reading, I said to him, “I feel like I’m the person you’re writing these books for. You’re writing these books for me.” And I meant it then and I mean it now. There’s a point at which LaValle started writing the books he knew he was meant to write (he has […]

An Intense Horror on Grief

Where Echoes Die by Courtney Gould

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Wow, this book… this is such a beautiful, painful story exploring grief and how not letting go, staying in the past can cause more harm than learning to move forward. Beck lost her mother only a few months ago and she and her sister are on their way to Texas to live with their dad, but first Beck has to find out the truth of Backravel, the place that her mother was investigating, the place that basically stole her mother from her. But things in […]

This is weird, even for Murakami

The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami

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I’m pretty sure I bought The Strange Library as an ebook, never read it, forgot it, then picked up the physical version in the library years later. This is not a book that would have translated well to the ebook form because the fold outs and page turns are pretty essential to the story. It also seems sort of like a children’s book, but feels too existential in a way. It’s weirdly philosophical in a way I can’t quite explain. Turns out libraries are indeed […]

The crowning exception to “The book is always better than the movie.”

Jaws by Peter Benchley

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While I’m sure there are those who disagree, Jaws is the crowning exception to the rule “The book is always better than the movie.” In adapting the book to the script the story was transformed, made stronger and streamlined, and fixed all of the problems of the novel. To be transparent, Jaws is my all-time favorite movie. Ok, maybe the top five but that’s splitting hairs and ranking is largely dependent on which of my favorite movies I have most recently seen. I love every […]

Grief As A Creative Force

Monstrilio by Gerardo Sámano Córdova

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I honestly don’t remember where I first heard about this book – Instagram? One of the dozens of bookish emails I seem to get every single day? Maybe just scrolling through the Libby app? However it came into my life, I am really glad it did. This one is about Magos and Joseph and their son, Santiago, who has just died when the book opens. He was born with only one lung, and after his body finally gives out, Magos, in her grief, removes a […]

What’s in the trunk Adelaide?

Lone Women by Victor LaValle

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Adelaide Henry is a woman on the run. She is traveling to Montana to take advantage of the offer of free land to homesteaders regardless of gender, dragging only an enormous steamer trunk behind her. Adelaide isn’t the only lone woman in Montana with secrets. Can she escape her past? What happens if she stops trying? Little House on the Prairie this is not. I picked this book up on the strength of past works by this author that I’ve enjoyed and was not disappointed. […]



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