Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A masterclass in the novella; body horror and racism collide.

Ring Shout by P. Djeli Clark

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We know that the people who join the Ku Klux Klan are monsters. Average people who act in monstrous, horrible ways. But what if some of the Klan members were actual monsters? Giant, hulking, dog-like beasts that want to consume and destroy Black people? Such is the premise of Ring Shout by P. Djeli Clark. Maryse, a Black woman, hunts these monsters in Prohibition America with the help of her magical sword infused with the anger, pain, and despair of Black men and women of […]

A good read for Mardi Gras

The Black God’s Drums by P. Djéli Clark

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P. Djéli Clark won a 2019 Alex Award for The Black God’s Drums, which was also a finalist for the Nebula, Hugo, Locus, and World Fantasy Awards. The Alex Award is given to 10 books annually by the Young Adult Library Services Association to books written for adults that appeal to readers aged 12-18. This is a short but riveting, action-packed novel set in New Orleans, 1884. As with his previous two works set in 1912 Cairo (A Dead Djinn in Cairo, The Haunting of […]

Steampunk Cairo!

A Dead Djinn in Cairo by P. Djeli Clark

The Haunting of Tram Car 015 by P. Djeli Clark

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I only recently became aware of award-winning author P. Djeli Clark, although he has been writing sci-fi/fantasy novellas and novels for at least 5 years. Novels that involve djinn are especially interesting to me, and when a couple of different folks (including our own Emmalita) mentioned Clark within days of each other, I decided to check him out and I downloaded EVERYTHING!! These first two offerings feature not just djinn and magical entities but also Cairene investigators whose backstories and interactions will, I hope, be […]

Ring Shout

Ring Shout by P. Djèlí Clark

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Ring Shout takes place in Georgia in 1922. Segregation, Jim Crow laws, and the KKK are part of everyday life. It’s up to Maryse and her friends Sadie, a sharpshooter, and Chef, a former soldier and explosives expert, to protect the community from evil. Klu Kluxxers look like regular Klansmen on the outside, but to those with the sight, they are monsters. Maryse wields a sword, but a special sword given to her by three godlike entities that contains the energy of generations of enslaved […]

So much goodness stuffed into one little novella.

The Black God's Drums by P. Djèlí Clark

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This was very entertaining, and very refreshing. I just wish it was longer! (That seems to be a common complaint.) This is an alternate history and steampunk fantasy novella set in New Orleans post-Civil War. In this version of history, the Civil War ended with two separate Americas, and New Orleans also seceded into a neutral city-state that is heavily diverse, and populated by many people from the free Caribbean region. Our main character is Creeper (given name Jacquelin, but don’t call her that, she […]



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