Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A Wonderful Classic Children’s Mystery

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

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The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin is a favorite of my grown up daughter.  She has probably read it a half dozen times over the past 15 or so years.  After she recently reread it, I decided to reread it also.  Well, the surprise was on me – I don’t think I had ever read it before. The book, published in 1978 and the Newbery winner that year, is a clever mystery that unfolds as the tenants of a building are invited to the reading […]

Love is powerful and wonderful and ridiculous

The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo

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“Is it ridiculous for a very small, sickly, big-eared mouse to fall in love with a beautiful human princess named Pea? The answer is . . . yes. Of course it’s ridiculous. Love is ridiculous. But love is also wonderful. And powerful. And Despereaux’s love for the Princess Pea would prove, in time, to be all of these things: powerful, wonderful, and ridiculous.” With that sentence, this Newbery Medal winner won my heart. The Tale of Despereaux is a classic fairy tale with a knight […]

Grown-Up Me May Have Overthought Things in Places but Wins in the End

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankenweiler by E.L. Konigsburg

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Bingo 21 (Back to School) I remember in elementary school being mightily impressed by From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankenweiler, but have no memory of what it was I liked or why I’d had to read the book in the first place. I suspect it was likely for a book report or reading hours. I kind of remember now upon a re-read over two decades later, in spite of some reactions to characters and situations that are likely the grown-up in me, […]

Teen witches, good witches, bad witches, swamp monster witches, and more!

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This was a lovely little fairy tale that had just enough familiar pieces that I thought I knew where everything was going, but just enough originality that I was intrigued throughout and couldn’t put it down, even though I was pretty sure there was sad stuff coming. Plus, two truly excellent secondary characters (I want a Glerk and a Fyrian of my very own – this book should come with a swamp monster and a Perfectly Tiny Dragon). Once upon a time, there was a […]

People don’t want to listen to their thoughts, so they fill the world with noise.

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In my ongoing quest to read all the Newbery Award Winners, I decided to read the most recent addition to the list. Hello, Universe won the Newbery Award in 2018, and boy am I under the impression that 2017 was a bad year for children’s books. It’s not a bad book, per se, it’s just not great in the way I’ve come to expect Newbery winners to be. It was a very fast read, even for a children’s novel, and it contained about a short […]

Then they don’t have to depend on the wind anymore.

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When You Reach Me won the Newbery Medal in 2010, and it kind of let me wondering if 2009 was just a bad year for published children’s novels. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a fine novel but I don’t think it holds up the way other Newbery winners have in the past. It is very strong on the nostalgia factor though, which makes me wonder if that is one of the reasons it won. Nostalgia for the Medal awarders obviously, not the children who read […]



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