Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A love letter to Arthurian legend told through inclusive re-imaginings

Sword Stone Table: Old Legends, New Voices by Edited by: Swapna Krishna and Jenn Northington

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Thank you, llamareadsbooks for gifting this book to me in the CBR Book Exchange! CBR14 Bingo: “Time” – This anthology moves through time, from the ancient past to the far future. Sword Stone Table first came to my awareness through emmalita’s review.  When narfna reviewed it a few weeks ago, it prompted me to move it to the top of the read pile.  I have a deep affection for stories about King Arthur and Camelot that probably started with the Disney animated version, was strengthened by […]

There was a game he could see and another he couldn’t, and he would play them both.

Sword Stone Table: Old Legends, New Voices by Swapna Krishna and Jenn Northington

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My formative King Arthur works were the 1963 Disney movie The Sword in the Stone, and 1975’s Monty Python and the Holy Grail. When I discovered Mary Stewart’s The Crystal Cave, as a preteen, my life as a reader of fantasy and romance was set. I’m a King Arthur enthusiast, but not a purist (except for Antoine Fuqua’s 2004 King Arthur – great cast, beautiful visuals, terrible movie that should never have been marketed as “historically accurate”). Hearing that a work is a retelling of […]

Hwæt? Bro!

Beowulf: A New Translation by Maria Dahvana Headley

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I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m not much one for reading poetry. I don’t know if I have some sort of mental tone-deafness or some other strange issue, but I can never get the cadence and tone right in my head. It has to be read aloud. Now while this is something that I can do myself, I prefer having poetry read to me. This was something Maria Dahvana Headley had in mind when she was working on a more contemporary translation of […]

BINGO BLACKOUT

Beowolf by Unknown, Francis Barton Gummere (Translation)

The Mere Wife by Maria Dahvana Headley

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I did it! I cannot believe I managed to pull this off but I realized that I would probably not participate next year and would have been disappointed to get so close this year only to fall short by a book or two. Lemme tell you though- these last two titles were a struggle…  CBR Bingo: Back to School Beowulf, Unknown Over the last few years I have reread several books from my high school years that I loved: In Cold Blood, The Great Gatsby, A […]

CBRBingo11: Remix

The Mere Wife by Maria Dahvana Headley

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This was a GOOD BOOK, y’all. It definitely broke my streak of meh thrillers. It’s also a retelling of Beowulf (a book I remember WAY more of than I expected to, considering I read it almost 20 years ago) which makes it my Remix! bingo square. “Listen,’ someone whispers into my ear. ‘Listen to me.’ Am I dead? ‘Listen,’ the voice whispers. ‘In some countries, you kill a monster when it’s born. Other places, you kill it only when it kills someone else. Other places, you let […]

Drop-kick That Magic Lamp into Mount Doom

The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories by Mahvesh Murad and Jared Shurin (editors)

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Short story collections are like Forrest Gump’s box of chocolates: you have to gnaw some nuts and chews to eventually find that chocolate truffle. That said, The Djinn Falls in Love is phenomenal. Six of the twenty-one stories are among the best short stories I have read. Ever. (Jhumpa Lahiri, I’m sorry to report that you’ve been bumped.)  The editors’s international ensemble of authors clearly did their research, populating their confident tales with every manner of djinn, jinn, and genie. Some lie in wait in […]



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