Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Losers, Misfits, and Boozers

Slow Horses by Mick Herron

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Since I’m being cruelly tortured by being forced to wait a whole long week between episodes for the new season I’ve decided to go back and read the first book in the Slough House series. I’m sure waiting patiently is part of MI5 spy training, probably real advanced stuff. It is here we first meet Jackson Lamb and his motley collection of ‘slow horses’. Each one has disgraced themselves in some spectacular way and needs to be relegated somewhere they can’t do any more damage […]

A Vajazzle on a Nun

London Rules by Mick Herron

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“We’re talking about a bunch of mindless bottom-feeders whose general ignorance of our way of life is tempered only by their indifference to human suffering, we’re all agreed on that?” “Is this the politicians or the killers?” “Good point, but I meant the killers.” This series follows a bunch of Mi5 (British secret service) agents who’ve messed up so badly that they end up at a building called Slough House and have been nicknamed the Slow Horses. They’re given mundane tasks, under a deliberately offensive […]

When your past tries to kill you

Spook Street by Mick Herron

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Spook Street centres around David Cartwright, a spook (spy) emeritus who is now losing his memory, burdening his grandson River. River joined the Mi5 British intelligence service, following in grandpa’s footsteps, but became a laughing stock now resigned to a subunit in Slough House with the other “Slow Horse” agents with metaphorical egg on their faces. But there are other spooks, too. We meet a new Slow Horse named Coe, who has been so traumatized that he can’t stand human contact and can only listen […]

Final 2024 Leftovers

1876 by Gore Vidal

Joe Country by Mick Herron

James by Percival Everett

Slough House by Mick Herron

Kiss Her Goodbye by Allan Guthrie

The Contemplative Tarot: A Christian Introduction to the cards by Brittany Muller

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Hope everyone had a wonderful 2024. Remember that while we can’t control the horrors of the world, there is joy to be found in the presence of those we love. 1876**** Didn’t hit as hard as Burr; Burr’s presence was the center of the story that made it go, whereas this book wants to highlight every major player in the 1876 election. But Vidal does a good job of evoking the atmosphere of the time: the unapologetic corruption, the paranoia of another war and the […]

The past and the present walk into a bar

Dead Lions by Mick Herron

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Slough House: a grimy station across from London’s Barbican Estate, tucked away above a Chinese restaurant that’s perpetually closed. It’s where MI5-rejects are sent in the hopes that they will quit, thus saving the service the headache of firing them. Against all odds, it has been drafted in protecting a visiting Russian oligarch with whom the British government is interested in striking a deal, or at least set up some sort of connection the way governments do. Two Slow Horses are ordered to babysit, though […]

Thanksgiving 2024 Leftovers

Remembrance Day by Henry Porter

Dead Lions by Mick Herron

Zero Days by Ruth Ware

Whisper Down the Lane by Clay McLeod Chapman

Killing Castro by Lawrence Block

Deadly Beloved by Max Allan Collins

Spy Hook by Len Deighton

London Rules by Mick Herron

Real Tigers by Mick Herron

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Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate. Remembrance Day**** An interesting take on the English-vs-Irish spy novel and while the author telegraphs too many things, he knows how to keep a story moving. Barely clears the 4-star threshold but if I invest time to read something almost 500 pages long, it has to be at least “good” and this was. Dead Lions, Real Tigers, and London Rules**** I had originally meant to do a big long post on my love/grr relationship with Mick Herron’s Slough House […]



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