Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Frankenstein

Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

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CBR14Bingo – Monster – It’s a about a monster. And while yes, Victor Frankenstein is a monster, the Monster is most definitely a monster.   The thing that always strikes me about Frankenstein, and I think this is probably my fifth or so time reading it is the narrative structure. It’s told entirely through the perspective and letters of Robert Walton, an adventurer at sea, after he sees the Monster on the ice, and then finds and befriend Victor, who is pursuing the monster. These […]

“This – not any particular piece of Vietnamese culture – is my inheritance: the inexplicable need and extraordinary ability to run when the shit hits the fan. My refugee reflex.”

The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui

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On 2022’s Read Harder Challenge Task 6 is to read a non-fiction YA comic. Each year when the Read Harder tasks are unveiled, I go through my over 600 book deep to read list on Goodreads looking for books to fulfill each task. I knew this one would be difficult, there just isn’t much in the way of non-fiction graphic works on my TBR, which is an area I could do to grow in (thus, doing this reading challenge each year since 2015). I was […]

If you haven’t caused a scene in a psych unit, it’s just because you haven’t been inside long enough.

The Devil in Silver by Victor LaValle

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The titular devil in LaValle’s The Devil in Silver comes in many forms. Its most obvious is the monster that roams the halls of the New Hyde psychiatric ward at night, attacking patients who leave their doors unlocked. When Pepper is committed against his will after committing a crime he doesn’t fully remember, he quickly comes face to face with this evil. Along with some of his companions on the ward, he sets out to solve the mystery of this hushed up resident of the […]

Locked Up in Myself, Never Gonna Get Free

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The protagonist of Monster is Steve Harmon, a teenager on trial for murder. He is accused of being the lookout for a corner store robbery which ended in the death of the store owner. Steve is not accused of being the person who pulled the trigger, just the guy who signaled to the others that it was safe to enter the store, but he is still charged with murder. The story is framed as a screenplay he’s writing about his own life and his trial, […]

Back on a true crime kick

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This book is very interesting. OK, that sentence feels like a 4th grade book report. Really though , it’s interesting. There are so many details, and such well researched facts. You can tell that the authors got a little obsessed with the Monster.  Their obsession cataloged thirty years worth of evidence, nearly half a dozen suspects (almost all were tried, convicted, and then acquitted), fourteen to sixteen murders, and two countries. Douglas Preston was an American author trying to write a crime novel. He met […]



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