Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Jersey? Sure.

The Barbed-Wire Kiss by Wallace Stroby

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Hmmmmm. I really liked this book. It’s a great first novel and I promise to read more Wallace Stroby. Thing is, I wanted to like this book more. But it leans one some of my least favorite tropes in male-written crime fiction. The first chapter is one of the best first chapters I’ve read in a crime novel. It does a great job of introducing setting, protagonist and problem. Right away, I was pulled into its bleak, lower-class Jersey shore atmosphere. The dialogue was finely tuned and […]

What Comes Next

By Way of Sorrow by Robyn Gigl

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Read as part of CBR13Bingo: they/she/he. The author is a trans woman and the protagonist (as well as another main character) is also a trans woman.  Once again, I’m grateful for book bingos because they challenge me to read stuff that I’ve been making excuses to put off. It’s no secret that the mystery/thriller world is largely devoid of bestselling LGBTQIA+ writers, specifically trans writers. This is not for lack of talent, rather a lack of seeking talent on behalf of publishing houses. On the rare […]

A really long review that has spoilers

Becoming Beatriz by Tami Charles

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This review is long as this book brought out a lot of feelings. Feelings of remembering books I read as a kid and didn’t get “the point” of. Feelings of current events. Feelings of not liking characters. And a lot more.  This is a book you experience and YMMV. Becoming Beatriz is the companion novel to Like Vanessa. It starts on the day Beatriz turns 15 and the night her brother is murdered by a rival gang. Like this incident was a sidebar in the […]

A semi-autobiographical debut novel that opens up a world

Like Vanessa by Tami Charles

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Like Vanessa is a sweet and realistic story of liking yourself, while finding your home, family and who you truly are. Tami Charles bases her character Vanessa on some of her own experiences making this an interesting combination of fact, fiction, history and contemporary issues. In 1983 Vanessa is a dark-skinned girl living in the inner city. Vanessa, her cousin, her beloved grandfather Pop-Pop and her father live in a small apartment. But they could not be farther apart if they live in a mansion. […]

Welcome to my first ever 1-star review

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CBR10 Bingo: Home, Something, Home (Janet Evanovich is from my home state of New Jersey, where the action in this novel also takes place.) I tend to be fairly generous in my reviews, with most of them falling in the 3- to 4-star range. Even if I don’t particularly care for a book, I appreciate that an individual has put herself out there and offered up something she created for the world to enjoy, and that deserves respect. Sometimes the process of writing a review calls my […]

Judy – love ya. Love this one? Not so much.

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As a woman in my 30s, I am definitely aware of the presence and significance of Judy Blume. And the fact that she recently celebrate her 80th birthday! (You hang in there, Judy). I read all the classics in my youth and read Summer Sisters a few years ago. I remember the former being formative and the latter not really at all, and that should have been an indicator of how I would feel about this book: a resounding shoulder shrug. I would say I […]



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