Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“People don’t often get murdered in banks. They’re usually rather difficult to escape from.”

A Drop of Corruption: An Ana and Din Mystery by Robert Jackson Bennett

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Continuing in the vein of the previous book, Ana Dolabra, the Empire’s most brilliant and mercurial detective, and her bemused assistant Dinios Kol, must solve a locked door mystery. This time it’s in the canton of Yarrowdale, at the very edge of the Empire’s reach. However, what Ana and Din first believe to be an abduction turns out to be a murder, one with no discernible method or motive. Until they realize that this crime may be geared towards bringing down the Shroud, where the […]

Politically topical and relevant but did it stray from what the first novel set up?

A Drop of Corruption by Robert Jackson Bennett

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I feel like I am the odd one out because I didn’t like this one as much as the previous one. Not sure if I had certain expectations for this novel and the fact that Bennett took a different approach colored my reaction or if it was something else entirely. It’s also why it’s taken me 2 months to even want to try to tackle this review. I wonder how much this is the novel he had originally intended to write when he started his […]

Nero Wolfe but make it Japanese

The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett

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When a book’s premise is basically “freaky murders happen in a Japan-like country dealing with a Kaiju problem, and the murders need to be solved by an uber-intelligent shut-in and her magically altered assistant”, you’re going to pique my interest. And this book delivered its premise in all the best ways. In the world of Daretana, there are walls built to keep the Kaiju from invading, where there blood can work strange magical changes and contagions are rampant. In one of the elite mansions, a […]

Corruption and Colonization (And Kaiju)

A Drop of Corruption by Robert Jackson Bennett

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Yes, Robert Jackson Bennett is back! I am an unabashed fan of most of his writing, and was massively impressed when I first read The Tainted Cup, about a year ago. It was delightfully weird and just a little bit creepy; a Holmes and Watson style investigation in a Roman-style setting, topped off with some mycology-based body horror. In The Tainted Cup, the greatest threat the Empire of Khanum faced was not just the murders, but the Leviathans—kaiju-like creatures that emerge from the sea to wreak […]

And all the world a savage garden

A Drop of Corruption by Robert Jackson Bennett

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One of my favourite releases last year was Robert Jackson Bennett’s The Tainted Cup, so I’ve been eagerly awaiting the next book in the series. Released last week, A Drop of Corruption continues the story of Ana Dolabra, brilliant-but-eccentric investigator, and Dinios Kol, her bisexual-disaster-with-a-photographic-memory assistant. Picking up about a year after the ending of The Tainted Cup, Ana and Din are called to the edge of the Empire to investigate a murder where the victim seemingly vanished into thin air. Further complicating matters is […]

Murder, Mystery and Mycology

The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett

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Wow. Not only is today a public holiday, but we’re also facing temperatures in Houston that would melt us faster than the Wicked Witch of the West. So of course this makes it an excellent kind of day to try and catch up with my sorely neglected reviews. I love most of Robert Jackson Bennett’s writing, but I had no idea what he was going to get up to after finishing The Founders Trilogy. Or when he was going to release anything after The Founders […]



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