Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time
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So Thirsty by Rachel Harrison

So Thirsty by Rachel Harrison

October 6, 2025 by Classic Leave a Comment

Trigger warning: Animal death, cannibalism, and gore. Bless Rachel Harrison for always showing us the folly of bad marriages and toxic friendships. I really did enjoy this book, but thought the ending was so unrealistic and very unsatisfying. I wish Harrison had gone as darker as she had with the ending of The Return. And I think that she didn’t delve enough into Sloane/Naomi’s messed up friendship. That said, I did enjoy this. So Thirsty follows Sloane who is leaving to go out of town […]

Filed Under: Featured, Horror Tagged With: Rachel Harrison, So Thirsty

Classic's CBR17 Review No:144 · Genres: Featured, Horror · Tags: Rachel Harrison, So Thirsty ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Demonology

Play Nice by Rachel Harrison

Fiend by Alma Katsu

September 24, 2025 by Jake Leave a Comment

I read two books last week, both horror, both the kind of horror that used its tropes to tell a larger tale… Play Nice**** I’ve confessed my love for Rachel Harrison’s work many times in this space. If you don’t count Stephen King — who I don’t exclusively read for horror — Harrison is my favorite horror writer. I love her textured takes on womanhood and the decisions women have to make at critical moments of their lives. I’m glad I was cued into her […]

Filed Under: Horror Tagged With: alma katsu, demons, family drama, fiend, Haunted House, horror, Play Nice, Rachel Harrison

Jake's CBR17 Review No:48 · Genres: Horror · Tags: alma katsu, demons, family drama, fiend, Haunted House, horror, Play Nice, Rachel Harrison ·
· 0 Comments

The Return by Rachel Harrison

The Return by Rachel Harrison

June 2, 2025 by Classic Leave a Comment

Trigger warning: Disordered eating. So I really liked this one, though parts of it dragged. I did think that there were a couple of dropped plot points (mostly around Tristan), but thought the book was a great horror novel looking at female friendships and what is really a best friend. Be warned though, it had a lot of body horror though for people who are squeamish. “The Return” follows 27 year old Elise who is stuck in a dead end life in Buffalo. Her other […]

Filed Under: Horror Tagged With: Rachel Harrison, The Return

Classic's CBR17 Review No:66 · Genres: Horror · Tags: Rachel Harrison, The Return ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Early Fall Leftovers

To Start A War: How the Bush Administration Took Us Into Iraq by Robert Draper

The Travelers by Chris Pavone

A Walk Among the Tombstones by Lawrence Block

Dark Fire by CJ Sansom

The Menendez Murders: The Shocking Untold Story of the Menendez Family and the Killings that Stunned the Nation by Robert Rand

Stasi Child by David Young

The Cover Wife by Dan Fesperman

So Thirsty by Rachel Harrison

Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of Norwich

Geiger by Gustaf Skördeman

Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 by Steve Coll

Slow Horses by Mick Herron

The Devil Knows You're Dead by Lawrence Block

October 14, 2024 by Jake Leave a Comment

I’ve read some interesting stuff lately and I wish I had made more time to document it but life gets in the way that life sometimes does. Not all bad, just life. To Start A War**** I had a long thing here about connecting this to the 2024 election but I don’t want to talk current electoral politics on here, at least the specifics of them. A good book if you want to know the intelligence (ha) perspective of how we wound up in a […]

Filed Under: Fiction, History, Horror, Mystery, Non-Fiction, Religion, Suspense Tagged With: #Henry VIII, #history, 9/11, A Walk Among the Tombstones, Afghanistan, Berlin, Chris Pavone, Christian mysticism, Christianity, CIA, CJ Sansom, Colin Powell, Condolezza Rice, Dan Fesperman, Dark Fire, David Young, East Germany, espionage, Forever Wars, Geiger, George W. Bush, Germany, Ghost Wars, Gustaf Skördeman, Hamburg, historical fiction, horror, Julian of Norwich, Karin Muller, lawrence block, London, Matthew Scudder, Matthew Shardlake, medieval england, mick herron, mystery, New York City, Osama Bin Laden, Rachel Harrison, Religion, Revelations of Divine Love, Robert Draper, Robert Rand, Sara Nowak, Slow Horses, So Thirsty, Stasi, Stasi Child, Steve Coll, Sweden, The Cover Wife, The Devil Knows you're Dead, The Travelers, Thomas Cromwell, To Start a war, Tudor England, vampires, War in Iraq

Jake's CBR16 Review No:168 · Genres: Fiction, History, Horror, Mystery, Non-Fiction, Religion, Suspense · Tags: #Henry VIII, #history, 9/11, A Walk Among the Tombstones, Afghanistan, Berlin, Chris Pavone, Christian mysticism, Christianity, CIA, CJ Sansom, Colin Powell, Condolezza Rice, Dan Fesperman, Dark Fire, David Young, East Germany, espionage, Forever Wars, Geiger, George W. Bush, Germany, Ghost Wars, Gustaf Skördeman, Hamburg, historical fiction, horror, Julian of Norwich, Karin Muller, lawrence block, London, Matthew Scudder, Matthew Shardlake, medieval england, mick herron, mystery, New York City, Osama Bin Laden, Rachel Harrison, Religion, Revelations of Divine Love, Robert Draper, Robert Rand, Sara Nowak, Slow Horses, So Thirsty, Stasi, Stasi Child, Steve Coll, Sweden, The Cover Wife, The Devil Knows you're Dead, The Travelers, Thomas Cromwell, To Start a war, Tudor England, vampires, War in Iraq ·
· 0 Comments

Be Witched

Cackle by Rachel Harrison

November 10, 2023 by Jake Leave a Comment

Been a slow drip of reading to start the month. So slow that I keep forgetting I actually finished this book a week ago and have been putting off this review. I liked it when I finished it and seven days later, I find myself appreciating it even more. I’ve now read through Rachel Harrison’s whole catalog, save her short story collection. Not a big fan of reading short story collections but I may need to get to hers because she’s a fun writer and […]

Filed Under: Fantasy, Horror Tagged With: cackle, horror, Rachel Harrison, witch, witches

Jake's CBR15 Review No:155 · Genres: Fantasy, Horror · Tags: cackle, horror, Rachel Harrison, witch, witches ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

The Cultish Homecoming

Black Sheep by Rachel Harrison

November 7, 2023 by Jake 3 Comments

There was a lot going on in the week following my purchase of this book, one I grabbed with great anticipation. So I saved it for the last few days to really savor the experience. Rachel Harrison’s The Return was a sneaky good read; I felt like I was on her storytelling wavelength and that helped overcome the many negative reviews that, I think, missed the point of her book. And now she’s writing a book about returning home to a religious cult? Hell yeah, let’s […]

Filed Under: Featured, Horror Tagged With: Black Sheep, cults, horror, Rachel Harrison, Religion

Jake's CBR15 Review No:136 · Genres: Featured, Horror · Tags: Black Sheep, cults, horror, Rachel Harrison, Religion ·
Rating:
· 3 Comments
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