Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“I couldn’t help it. It just popped in there.” – Ray Stantz

The DarkDeep by Allie Condie, Brendan Reichs

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CBR11Bingo – And So It Begins . . . Nico isn’t totally beloved in the town of Timbers, after his dad’s environmental lobbying meant the loss of a lot of jobs from Timbers’ lumber industry.  Luckily he has his best friends Tyler and Emma to pass the time and dodge the bullies (mostly Logan Nantes, whose dad runs the lumber mill).  One way they avoid Logan and his cronies is by spending their time at Still Cove, the cliffside on the edge of town where […]

Each word clicking into place as if he were making a puzzle out of glass

The Lifters by Dave Eggers

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cbr11bingo:  Readers Choice (swapping in the COLLECTION square) Twelve-year-old Granite Flowerpetal doesn’t love his name, even though his father named him Granite to grant him strength. He tries to rebrand himself as “Gran” and while it does take on, he quickly has second thoughts. But his new identity is only one piece of his jumbled up life.  His parents, seeking new work for his father, have moved them to the Flowerpot family hometown and house, in a town whimsically named Carousel after the craft of […]

It’s what makes the hatters mad…

Killer Style: How Fashion Has Injured, Maimed, and Murdered Through History by Alison Matthews David, Serah Marie McMahon

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#CBR11Bingo – History/Schmistory! Killer Style is a quick read for anyone interested in fashion history. It is geared towards tweens and teens, but the information is great for older readers too.  The book accounts different ways that clothes have been dangerous to people. The authors lean less on freak accidents and more on how industrialization and the clothing construction industry have killed people in the making of clothes.  (We do get our fair share of freak accidents, though.) We get information from the ways poisonous […]

“In the name of King Arthur, and of the old world before the dark came.”

Over Sea, Under Stone by Susan Cooper

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CBRBingo11 – Back to School! I’ve read this book about 800 times. The first time I read it was with my fifth grade class, and I’ll forever thank Mrs Cook for introducing us to this wonderful story. I blasted through the rest of the five-book “sequence” after that and it remains my favorite middle grade series (before middle grade was a thing). This year I am participating once again in the Dark is Rising readathon  and so it also made sense for this to be […]

Hurricanes Can Be Inside, Just as Much as Outside

Hurricane Season by Nicole Melleby

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I always have a little trepidation reviewing a book written by someone I know in a professional capacity, so as much as I’ve been excited to read Hurricane Season since finding out it was being published last year, I was also really worried about giving it an honest review. But not only can I say that I enjoyed it, but it was so good it made me cry the good tears and I want to ship a copy to literally every person I know.  I’m […]

Dear Sweet Pea, Julie Murphy’s MG debut

Dear Sweet Pea by Julie Murphy

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CBR11Bingo – Own Voices! Holy poop, this is my 52nd review! I’ve officially cannonballed! Not that I’ll stop playing now, though. I am a huge fan of Julie Murphy’s YA books, so when I saw the ARC for her middle grade debut was available at Book Expo, I knew I’d be snapping it up both for my pleasure reading and for my work on the RI Middle School Book Award Committee! While I’d usually save my off-committee summertime for “anything but children’s books”, I decided […]



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