Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

An Amazing Queer Historical Mystery

The Bell in the Fog by Lev A.C. Rosen

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When I heard there was going to be a sequel to Lavender House, I knew I had to get my hands on it. Plus I love that Rosen writes such complex, messy queer characters who aren’t necessarily good people, but their queerness isn’t why they’re not good people. I really love Andy, his community, and the ways he’s growing since leaving the police force and finding a family that accepts him for who he is, no hiding needed. This story especially shows him making so […]

An Emotional, Vital Story

Only This Beautiful Moment by Abdi Nazemian

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I don’t know that I know how to talk about this book except that GOSH it’s amazing and good and powerful and I am so glad it exists and I can’t wait for more people to have the chance to read it! At its core, Only This Beautiful Moment is a story of family and community, of fighting for your beliefs and also learning who you are and want to be. Told across three generations, Moud, Saeed, and Bobby are each discovering their history and […]

A Fantastic YA Centering Queer History & Adventure

Lion’s Legacy by LC Rosen

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Gosh, gosh, gosh! This book, LC’s writing reminds me how reading a queer book by a queer author really does hit differently, in the best ways. Tennessee Russo is a teen who’s been going on adventures with his dad to find ancient artifacts for his dad’s tv show since his bar mitzvah, but at fifteen he starts to see the way his dad sells the artifacts as unethical, which results in a fight where his dad abandons him in Japan. Two years later, Ten has […]

“There are two people inside me and they are at war with each other.”

Miss Iceland by Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir, Brian FitzGibbon (Translator)

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This is a book that you have to give yourself over to, you have to meet it where it is and accept its way of imparting the story, of whether there is a story at all, and how the author has built her main character, and how that main character chooses to share her world with you. Once you’ve done that the book embraces you like waves coming onshore. But is it the cold waters of the North Atlantic or something warmer? I have my […]

Snatch, Lewks, Shade, and Werk (an no, there are no typos here)

Legendary Children: The First Decade of RuPaul’s Drag Race and the Last Century of Queer Life by Tom Fitzgerald, Lorenzo Marquez

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Legendary Children: The First Decade of RuPaul’s Drag Race and the Last Century of Queer Life covers a wide range of subjects in shallow depth. The introduction is open about this, and the authors suggest you go ask Youtube and Google about further details. On the one hand, this is a good goal, to encourage people to further explore things of interest. On the other hand, it can also be a problem such as when a queen named Michelle is important but not discussed much […]

True crime and queer history.

Last Call: A True Story of Love, Lust, and Murder in Queer New York by Elon Green

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Thanks to Celadon Books for the ARC! It has not affected the content of my review. I wish I had gotten to this book before publication, but better late than never. I was offered an ARC and accepted gladly, as I’d wanted to read the book anyway. It then arrived weeks late, presumably because the USPS is having some capital ‘I’ Issues right now. The book was worth the wait, though, even if I was sort of unsettled and left a bit unsatisfied at the […]



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