Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

First Book of the Year – A Book About Books

The Book That Wouldn’t Burn by Mark Lawrence

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This is a late start for me this year—I have had a very busy couple of months. Hopefully things smooth out a bit! Lucky me, Mark Lawrence knocks it out of the park again. The man can write some serious engaging blends of fantasy and science fiction. With The Book That Wouldn’t Burn—the first book of his new trilogy—we have a love letter to stories, libraries and nostalgia.  Unlike a number of his previous trilogies (yes, the man is a prolific writer) The Book That […]

Wizkit the a one-eyed cat

Wizkit: An Adventure Overdue by Tanya J. Scott

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Wizkit: An Adventure Overdue by Tanya J. Scott is an actually terribly cute story that had a bit more punch than expected. This is a true case of not judging a book by its cover. At first glance I figured it would be silly and not have any real “meat” to it. Yet, I was happily surprised.  The illustrations are sweet and simple, allowing focus to be on the story itself but allows for strong support as well. Things are colorful and draw your eye […]

“All the things that are wrong in the world seem conquered by a library’s simple unspoken promise: Here I am, please tell me your story; here is my story, please listen.”

The Library Book by Susan Orlean

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Look, I’m just gonna do the thing. Here is (part of) the blurb: On the morning of April 29, 1986, a fire alarm sounded in the Los Angeles Public Library. As the moments passed, the patrons and staff who had been cleared out of the building realized this was not the usual fire alarm. As one fireman recounted, “Once that first stack got going, it was ‘Goodbye, Charlie.’” The fire was disastrous: it reached 2000 degrees and burned for more than seven hours. By the […]

Reading the city

City Under the City by Dan Yaccarino

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I think I have read City Under the City before. However, I did not really remember it at all. Sure, things seemed a smidgen familiar, but the theme is similar in other works and I always find samples here and there so that’s why a page or two wasn’t completely “fresh.”  And that is not necessarily a bad thing as I was able to read it fresh. And like with another book I read and this happened to me, I was able to take something […]

Books, friends and mystery

Escape from M. Lemoncello’s Library, the graphic novel by Chris Grabenstein

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Not having read the novel, that Escape from M. Lemoncello’s Library, the graphic novel is based on (that is of the same name), I am not sure how this book was adapted. However, the author Chris Grabenstein did the adaptation, so I am assuming it is mostly the same. Regardless, this graphic novel illustrated by Douglas Holgate is a fun, easy read that has puns, hidden surprises, a good message, and a lot of books that are mentioned, that are read and that are used […]

A little love

Love in the Library by Maggie Tokuda-Hall’

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Around seventh grade I first heard about the Japanese American internment camp stories because my aunt is Japanese American. But it was not until I was much older that it clicked. My aunt, her siblings, her mother, and my cousins, not to mention her aunts, uncles and cousins would have been incarcerated. And while I was able to find a little here and there, it was difficult until the last few years to find things that were well done or interesting enough to keep me […]



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