Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A girl, her ghost friend, and adventure in Edinburgh (bonus review from Ysakitty)

City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab

by Leave a Comment

Previous novels by Victoria (V.E.) Schwab were intended for adults and teens, City of Ghosts was written for a middle grade audience.  I give it a three stars for being a solid book but no higher as it shared several concepts with her “Monsters of Verity” duology, which were the most recent books of Ms. Schwab’s that I’ve read. As a result, City of Ghosts didn’t feel very fresh to me,  especially when you take into account the variety of her collected works. In City of Ghosts, as in “Monsters […]

Just in case the history books don’t cover gay history for your kids

The Stonewall Riots: Coming Out in the Streets by Gayle E. Pitman

by Leave a Comment

This history of the Stonewall Riots is intended for middle grade readers. Pitman does a lovely job of setting the stage for the world that the riots occurred in, with pictures of locations, people, and items, as well as back stories of the individuals and institutions involved. The prose is clear and easy to follow, if a bit dry, in my opinion. While I liked the book, it was a little different than I expected. Some of the weirdness was the digital galley–it looked strange […]

“There could be love.”

The Giver (Graphic Novel) by Lowry, Lois; Russell, P. Craig

by Leave a Comment

I read The Giver for my sixth grade language arts class.  Sixth grade is apparently the year that our school decided we were ready to be ruined by literature. Between this, Bridge to Terebithia, and Where the Red Fern Grows, I don’t know how I had the will to read anymore. I guess that’s the amazing thing about well-written literature. It rips your heart in two and yet you keep going back for more! If you are one of the few people who haven’t visited this […]

I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Harry Potter, #3) by J.K. Rowling

by Leave a Comment

Oh, wow, so it’s been a month since I read this. Good thing I’ve read it five billion times; my reactions are always fresh and ready to go! And also I took pictures of all the quotes I wanted to talk about. This review is not quite the 10,000 words as requested, but I suppose it will do. (I anticipate my review of Goblet of Fire to be monstrous.) I just needed to get this done before I started the next one on 4/1. Ooh, […]

A lovely book with a beautiful cover

The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill

by Leave a Comment

4.5 stars Because tradition dicatates it, each year on a certain day, the council of elders in the Protectorate take an infant and leave it in the woods as a sacrifice to the witch. Bad things will happen to the settlement if they don’t (although no one is really clear what dire consequences there will be, because there has never been a time when they didn’t place a child in the woods). Normally, the grieving family whose child has been selected meekly go along with […]

Wonderful mental health discussion in super hero comic aimed at young girls

DC Super Hero Girls: Out of the Bottle by Shea Fontana (author), Marchelo DiChiara (illustrator), Agnes Garbowska (illustrator)

by Leave a Comment

For those unfamiliar with the DC Super Hero Girls franchise the concept is that many classic DC comics characters are teenagers attending Super Hero High School, focusing on the female supers.  Another neat twist is that villains aren’t villains yet, they might be morally flexible but they are still overall more good than bad.  My eleven and seven year old daughters have been fans for several years now.  They have watched the animated shows and movies, and read two of the chapter books, but only […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo