Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Viking Romance and Fierce Heroines

The Bone King and the Starling by Elizabeth Stephens

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The Bone King and the Starling fulfills the “B” square of CBR17 Bingo. I enjoyed Elizabeth Stephens’ Xiveri Mates series and recently loved All Superheroes Need PR, though I’ve been hesitant to give The Bone King and the Starling a try based on the content notes (which can be found on the author’s website, and definitely encourage checking them before checking this book). I finally succumbed to curiosity. I read through several reviews, and the thing that stood out is there is supposed to be an extended sex […]

The Murderbot Diaries – the novellas and the short stories. Some were re-reads, some were new to me

All Systems Red by Martha Wells

Artificial Condition by Martha Wells

Rapport: Friendship, Solidarity, Communion, Empathy by Martha Wells

Rogue Protocol by Matha Wells

Exit Strategy by Martha Wells

Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory by Martha Wells

Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells

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My original reviews and ratings for the first four novellas can be found here. CBR17 Bingo: Favourite (goes for the whole series, and the protagonist) All Systems Red Nowhere Book Bingo 25: First in a series   It’s been five years since I first read The Murderbot Diaries, and it was interesting to revisit the original novella. This was selected as the January selection for my real-life book club (with the option to read the other three if people had time). While a lot of the members really enjoyed […]

Personhood in Sci-Fi

Volatile Memory by Seth Haddon

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Volatile Memory fulfills the “purple” square on CBR17 bingo. Generally speaking, I don’t consider myself a sci-fi reader, but Volatile Memory kept coming across my feeds because it’s sapphic and I finally gave into the promo, and I’m glad I did because this ended up being a really interesting story. I’d put it in the same conversations as books like Automatic Noodle and The Stars Too Fondly for the ways it explores transness and gender through presentation as well as whether memories make a person […]

Runner’s high

Elevation by Stephen King

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I stumbled upon this little novella of Mr King amongst the ‘suggested for you’ Kindle books. It surprised me a little to see a King novel that I both haven’t read AND haven’t heard of, but there it was on the list. So I quickly purchased it and gave it a whirl. In typical fashion, Elevation takes place in a small town in Maine: Castle Rock. Here we meet Scott Carey, a single middle aged white guy, who works at home and gets angry when […]

“Regrets are more fun when the choices they derive from are made intentionally.”

How to Steal a Galaxy by Beth Revis

Last Chance to Save the World by Beth Revis

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I was having a bit of a reading slump – nothing sounded good, and I returned several books to the library unread, which is a bit out of character for me. I had figured, though, that since I had such a fun time with Full Speed to a Crash Landing by Beth Revis last month that her brand of space heists in novella format might be what I needed to jumpstart my oomph. Then we got word that Bothari43 had passed, and I knew that […]

A hopeful future with robots and food

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

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If you need a story of chosen family and hope and good food, Automatic Noodle absolutely fits the bill. This is a delightful novella of a near-future where California has split from the United States after war, and part of California progressiveness was to give civil rights to human equivalent embodied intelligence (HEEI) robots. But those rights are limited – they’re not able to use a bank, own property, and there’s lots of prejudice against robots (very allegorical to American attitudes towards immigrants and marginalized […]



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