Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Native artists give insight

Dreaming in Indian: Contemporary Native American Voices by Lisa Charleyboy and Mary Beth Leatherdale

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I will start with a slightly controversial statement with my review of  Dreaming in Indian: Contemporary Native American Voices edited by Lisa Charleyboy and Mary Beth Leatherdale: The stories, poetry, essays, photographs and more, are familiar events and journeys that have relatable elements for almost anyone who has ever been an outsider. Regardless of if you are a  minority, I think most people can relate to the prejudices, the destruction of history and faith, and taking the lands of people. And some of the themes […]

The Rough-Face Girl Had Faith In Herself and She Had Courage

The Rough-Face Girl by Rafe Martin & David Shannon

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In this Algonquin rendition of Cinderella, The Rough-Face Girl lives with her father and two beautiful yet cruel sisters in a village on the shores of Lake Ontario. On the outskirts of the village lives the Invisible Being; a rich, powerful, and supposedly very handsome man who every woman in the village has set her sights on. However, to win his hand the women have to get past his sister and the tests she places in their paths. When her stepsisters fail, can the Rough-Face […]

Fresh scares from a needed perspective

Living Ghosts and Mischievous Monsters: Chilling American Indian Stories by Dan SaSuWeh Jones

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Readers who have been craving a selection of tales reminiscent of Alvin Schwartz’s Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark should look no further than Living Ghosts and Mischievous Monsters: Chilling American Indian Stories, compiled by Ponca storyteller Dan SaSuWeh Jones.  Jones is a busy guy: he is a writer, producer, and artist; he’s worked as an Imagineer for Disney and produced for Sesame Street; he is a sculptor, a former Chairman of the Ponca Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma, and he assembled this creepy collection of […]

The Navajo Lens

Shutter by Ramona Emerson

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I have always pursued good character-driven crime fiction. Yes, plotting is important and necessary to a good story but as I’ve said many times, I need a reason to care about what’s going on. The less I care about the characters, the less I’ll care about what’s going down. This is why whodunits rarely do it for me: they’re too focused on the mystery to make me care about who killed who. Shutter is not a tightly-plotted novel and that might bother some readers but I was so […]

“All I’ve ever tried to do is the right thing. If that’s so very different from how things have been done before, then what’s done before was wrong.”

To Shape a Dragon's Breath by Moniquill Blackgoose

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CBR16 Bingo: Smash – This book combines elements of fantasy (dragons) and science fiction (steampunk). The cultures depicted also smash and clash together throughout the book. All Anequs wants to do is live in peace with her tribe, content to be ignored by the Anglish conquerers who’ve taken over most of the continent. However, when she bonds with the first dragon to hatch on their island in generations, she must attend their academy and adapt to their ways if she hopes to keep her dragon. This […]

For what was earth but a mirror of heaven? And what was she but a thing caught in between?

Mirrored Heavens by Rebecca Roanhorse

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The first two books in Rebecca Roanhorse’s Between Earth and Sky series, Black Sun and Fevered Star, are two of my favorite books of the last five years. I’ve proselytized these books so many times, and now, at last, I can tell people the end is worth it. Mirrored Heavens is a tense read. There were many points where I had to put my tablet down and pace in circles because otherwise I would scream just to relieve the pressure. This is exactly the kind of […]



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