Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Love, Ghosts and Werewolves

Blackwater by Jeannette Arroyo and Ren Graham

by Leave a Comment

I found a way to read Blackwater by Jeannette Arroyo and Ren Graham online. Now, I will tell you, buy the book in July instead of doing this. I mean, I read the book that way and still plan on purchasing a copy. Not only do you support an author/illustrator this way, but you will also want to read this book wherever you are. And if you have no service for phone or tablet or whatever kids read on these days, well old school is […]

MASTERPIECE.

Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

by 7 Comments

I was originally tempted to just post this whole novel as one giant (and perfect) quotation. We knew it was coming but we behaved inconsistently. We stocked up on supplies-just in case-but sent our children to school, because how do you get any work done with the kids at home? (We were still thinking in terms of getting work done. The most shocking thing in retrospect was the degree to which all of us completely missed the point.) One day, when we look back at […]

“…a duty, out of sheer cussedness, not to disappear completely, simply to ease the conscience of the rest.”

Girl in the Dark by Anna Lyndsey

by 1 Comment

I thought this was going to be a depressing read that I trudged through because it was short and I sometimes feel obligated to bear witness to others’ pain. That was not at all the case. This book is gorgeous. It’s poetic and absolutely beautiful. There’s a recurring metaphor for suicidal thoughts that it just incredible. It’s funny and sad and really, really, really beautiful. It wasn’t that I didn’t think someone with a debilitating illness (in Lyndsey’s case, she has an extreme sensitivity to […]

“Stories are the wildest thing of all, the monster rumbled. Stories chase and bite and hunt.

by 1 Comment

Pretty much every night, Conor wakes up screaming from the same nightmare. So when the monster shows up in his garden, just after midnight, he’s not as scared as you may have thought that he’d be. After all, he deals with some pretty unpleasant things on a daily basis. The bullies who pick on him in school. The fact that he seems to be falling out with his only friend. The teachers either ignoring him or being overly understanding and solicitous. His father, who seems […]

The girl in the bubble and the boy in black

by Leave a Comment

3.5 stars Madeleine has never left her house or been outside. She’s got a rare auto-immune disorder and lives in a house hermetically sealed, with special filters making sure nothing gets in that could hurt her. The only people she sees regularly are her mother, whose a doctor, and her nurse, Carla. On very special occasions, when he’s been decontaminated thoroughly, she’s allowed to meet one of her favourite tutors, but Madeline’s life is lived mostly vicariously through books and the internet, dreaming of the […]

“Everything that isn’t loving a child is just for show.”

by Leave a Comment

Grace is a married mother of three. Her youngest, three year old Jack, is terminally ill. She has a background in epidemiology. She also is having an affair with her high school boyfriend. An allegation is made by an unknown party, accusing Grace of Munchhausen’s by proxy – making Jack sick in order to get attention from medical personnel. She is horrified to realize that she does perfectly fit the profile of a MBP mother. This book was absolutely heartbreaking, but I absolutely adored it. […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo