Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Ultimately Comforting and Hopeful

All the Devils are Here by Louise Penny

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This is the 16th Inspector Gamache mystery, and I’m honestly impressed with how consistent these books are. There’s been a couple that I didn’t care for much or had trouble getting into, but on the whole these books always work for me. All the Devils are Here was no different–in fact, I think it was one of my favorites thus far. Armand Gamache, his wife Reine-Marie, and his godfather Stephen are in Paris visiting Armand and Reine-Marie’s children and their families–including Jean-Guy Beauvoir, Armand’s former second in […]

January 2022 Leftovers

Hit Parade by Lawrence Block

Sex Criminals, Volume 1: One Weird Trick by Matt Fraction, Chip Zdarsky

Devils In Exile by Chuck Hogan

Ex Machina, The Deluxe Edition: Vol. 2 by Brian K. Vaughan

A Trick of the Light by Louise Penny

Munich by Robert Harris

Shella by Andrew Vachss

Blitzed: Drugs in the Third Reich by Norman Ohler

The Accomplice by Lisa Lutz

No One Will Miss Her by Kat Rosenfeld

The Man in the Brown Suit by Agatha Christie

The Second Sleep by Robert Harris

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My resolution for Cannonball Read in 2022 is to only write reviews where I feel like I have much to say and then dump the others in a singular post at the end of the month to track how much I’ve read. This’ll spare me from writing 250+ words about books that I can’t even think of a hundred for. So… Hit Parade **** I enjoy these books and while this is the one I maybe enjoyed the least (did EVERY story need cutaway conversations with […]

This series is not for me

Still Life by Louise Penny

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Hoo boy…after the high of the previous book I reviewed, this one took a hard turn into disappointment.  It should have been everything I like in a book – a no-nonsense detective, mysterious death, some quirky characters who may or may not be the perpetrator of the crime.  It’s even set in small town Quebec – I’m Canadian, this should be great!  Even most of the reviews were glowing, and as the first book in a series I hoped to be able to settle into […]

Bring Out Yer Dead!

Bury Your Dead by Louise Penny

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This was cruising to a 4-star rating and probably the title of my favorite Gamache read. And instead, it lands at 3. Why? A variety of reasons. I liked that most of the action, specifically Gamache’s action, took place outside of Three Pines. I don’t find Three Pines as fascinating as the writer does. Ideally, this series would just take Gamache to different parts of Quebec. Such is life. I also liked that Penny gave Jean-Guy some run. Occasionally, she writes him as too much […]

“Everyone had strengths. And weaknesses. The important thing was to recognize them. And not expect something from someone who didn’t have it to give.” (CBR Bingo #11)

All the Devils Are Here (Chief Inspector Gamache #16) by Louise Penny

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Through the first fifteen books in the Inspector Gamache series there is only one book I’ve rated five stars, A Trick of the Light. It’s a doozy of a book, and it dug deep into how characters cope with trauma, addiction, and stress, and any number of other forces that would separate us from our best selves. When I finished All the Devils Are Here, the 16th book in the series, I had my first impulse to rate one of these five stars since the […]

Brutal Indeed

The Brutal Telling by Louise Penny

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Read as part of CBR13Bingo: Book club. I’m part of a mystery readers book club that goes through the Gamache series.  Whoo is the title accurate. Throughout the book, I had a sense of where it was going to go because I’ve read enough of this series and I’m aware of why it is so popular (handsome guy who everyone wishes was their dad blows into charming, rustic village to solve the case) to take the liberty of assumption as I pour through it. But I […]



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