Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“But it’s too late:” YA Nihilism and Queer Tragedy

As You Wish by Chelsea Sedoti

by 2 Comments

This book was surface level readable, but morally it’s made me more and more mad the longer I think about it. It’s the kind of YA book where you read it in an intense sitting but are also irritated that the author isn’t trying to do more with the material. There is a lot jammed in here — a town where everyone gets a wish on their eighteenth birthday, football angst, romantic angst, dealing with your little sister being hit by a car and blaming […]

Toxic Air

the_atmospherians by Isle McElroy

by Leave a Comment

 At times, this seems like a somewhat simple book about a disgraced influencer who starts a cult with her childhood best friend. When you step away from it and look at the balancing act McElroy pulled off though, you realize they pulled off the ultimate achievement of making something difficult look easy. McElroy throws so many balls in the air and keeps juggling, successfully introducing challenging and difficult elements to make this tight-rope walk of a book work. The book begins with Sasha, a disgraced […]

“On that long journey she wept all the tears stored in her soul, leaving none in reserve for later sorrows.”

Eva Luna by Isabel Allende, Margaret Sayers Peden (translator)

by Leave a Comment

It has been a few years since I last tackled an Allende work, but with tasks in both the Read Harder and Reading Women challenges about translated works (the former asking for non-European novel in translation, the latter asking specifically for a book by a South American author in translation) I had the perfect excuse to move Eva Luna up my to read list. The amount of emotion, detail, and characterization that Allende weaves into her writing is simply astounding. It always takes me a […]

Magical realism at its most wonderful

The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina by Zoraida Córdova

by Leave a Comment

BINGO – Flora (there’s a small flower at the center of the cover and Orquídea means ‘orchid’ in Spanish) The Inheritance of Orquidea Divina is told with two narratives: one of the past life of Orquídea Divina, matriarch of the Montoya family and the other of the Montoya family in present day. Orquídea is dying and she summons her family to her home to receive their inheritance. The family gathers and soon realize that no one is getting the family cuckoo clock or heirloom jewelry. No, Orquídea […]

Sex, death, and queerness: a delightfully horrifying collection

Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado

by Leave a Comment

BINGO – Reader’s Choice in place of Home In Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado has compiled eight short stories that are all unabashedly queer and horrifying. Much like Mariana Enriquez, another Latina short story horror writer I’ve read this year, Machado erases the line between the natural and supernatural. Magical realism floods every sentence. Whereas Enriquez’s stories tend to focus on social structures and politics, Machado focuses on sex and gender identity. In these short stories, Machado manages to illicit dread and […]

“What broke your heart so completely that its splinters found their way through generations?”

The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina by Zoraida Córdova

by 1 Comment

CBR13Bingo: Uncannon a beautiful work of fantasy that tells one story of generational trauma in fantastical terms Magical realism isn’t usually my thing, but I couldn’t resist that unbelievably gorgeous cover. And I am ever so glad I picked this book up. It’s about generational trauma and making a home and family secrets, about how bringing those secrets into the light can wound and heal. “Orquídea was so many things: evasive, silent, mean, secretive, loving, and a liar.” Orquídea Montoya was born unlucky, but early on she […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo