Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

‘“Nonsense, my dear! It is the 1920s, you know.” She squeezed Bella’s hand. “The world is changing. For the better, I hope.”’

Hotel Portofino by J.P. O'Connell

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CBR 14 Bingo: Hot We are on the Italian Riviera in high summer, and the characters lavish in beach days and garden parties. Bella Ainsworth has just opened her hotel in Portofino, but she is already facing trouble – unruly guests, blackmail, and some business about a Rubens… This was my second stab at this book. I received an audiobook ARC originally, but I found it could not keep my attention so I went with an ebook for the library instead and it coasted by […]

[got me] to a nunnery!

Matrix by Lauren Groff

Heloise & Abelard: A New Biography by James Burge

The Tigress of Forlì: Renaissance Italy's Most Courageous and Notorious Countess, Caterina Riario Sforza de Medici by Elizabeth Lev

Letters of a Portuguese Nun: Uncovering the Mystery Behind a 17th Century Forbidden Love by Myriam Cyr

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I thought I was going to need some time to recover from the exquisite The Everlasting, but really it flung me head-first into a literal rabbit-hole. A warren. An abbey. A nunnery, if you will. Also- The Atlantic just posted a list of books that were done dirty by pandemic releases, and OF COURE The Everlasting resides within those vaulted halls. I was immediately drawn to Caterina Riario Sforza de Medici after she was mentioned several times in The Everlasting. A distant relative of her spots her likeness in the […]

Love is Not the End-All

The Star-Crossed Sisters of Tuscany by Lori Nelson Spielman

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“To me, love is more like a lending library. To keep it, we must continually renew it. Otherwise we pay a hefty fine.” There is a purported family curse that afflicts the Fontana family – that second-born daughters will never find true love and wed. When their estranged great-aunt Poppy promises to break the curse if they accompany her on a trip to Italy, Emilia and Lucy’s lives change radically. This was a warm and engaging read about a trio of women who are misfits […]

Ferrante Never Misses

The Lost Daughter by Elena Ferrante

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…I state, after only reading two of her novels and two of her shorter pieces…but at this rate, I am all-in on Elena Ferrante and I am STILL mad at myself for taking this long to catch on. I’m two books deep in the Neapolitan Novels, but I had to interrupt my trajectory for two reasons: I needed to read this story before seeing the new (read: 2021) film adaptation I need to see the film in order to solidify all of my (mostly negative) […]

A fun, sexy conclusion

The Don by Katrina Jackson

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It isn’t new to say Katrina Jackson is one of my absolute favorite authors and I hate that she made me love a mafia romance series, but here we are. The Don has been being set up since Beautiful and Dirty, and what a fantastic conclusion to the series! Now to wait for the spin-offs~ Shae and her cousin are sent to Italy by the Council of Aunties to retrieve her other cousin, but almost immediately she runs into Salvatore – a man she met […]

Vino with Guido

Death at La Fenice by Donna Leon

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Death at La Fenice is the first of 31 Commissario Brunetti mysteries. If you haven’t heard of this series, which began in 1992, Commissario Brunetti is a middle-aged detective in Venice, Italy. This inaugural mystery begins with a very dead, very famous maestro found on the floor of his dressing room. Tragic? Yes. But also very inconvenient – he died during the intermission of an opera! Word quickly spreads, as do the rumors and innuendo. Did he die of old age? Was he murdered? With […]



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