Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Twitter Win Fizzles

This is How You Lost the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone

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Twitter was kind of saved from doom recently by a guy loudly and proudly promoting his favorite new book, and encouraging others to do the same. I approve of this behavior. I was with Bigolas Dickolas (a Monty Python reference, I hope) in his enthusiasm for about the first half of This is How You Lose the Time War, but then it lost me. The problem for me is that there is not enough world and character building to hold interest and keep the story […]

“…with understanding, all things were possible.”

Light from Uncommon Stars by Ryka Aoki

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Riddle me this: what do you create when you combine a violin prodigy, “the Queen of Hell”, and an alien doughnut maker? If you are Ryka Aoki, you create a wild, delicious, devastating, hilarious brew. Does it hold together in a tight narrative? Light from Uncommon Stars does not. Does it thrill your senses and grow your heart? It absolutely does. We are first introduced to Katrina Nguyen, a teenage trans girl, as she is running away from a brutal home, carrying her beloved violin. […]

Taking the easy joke here, this book made me want to die inside.

Dying Inside by Robert Silverberg

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I had a hard time deciding between one and two star rating for Dying Inside, as it was well written and the literary voice was engaging. But I found this to be vile. A sexist, racist, masturbatory exploration of a really cool concept. Dude took the laziest option and tried to be profound with it. Ick. Thanks a lot, TBR Jar! Anyway, as you can see, I ended up at 1.5 stars rounded up, because I am willing to extend some leeway for all the positive […]

Math problems on Mars.

Singer Distance by Ethan Chatagnier

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I said in a status update while reading Singer Distance that it was giving me Contact vibes, and that’s true. The homespun science and grungy academic feel of the book, along with a group of characters working towards contacting aliens does give me the same feelings I get watching that movie (I have the book and I really need to finally read it!), but Singer Distance also has its own unique feel. This is an alternate history where back in the late 1800s, scientists spotted a message on Mars and began […]

We stan a vintage janky paperback in this house.

Special Deliverance by Clifford D. Simak

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This wasn’t nearly as good as Way Station, which I read back in 2020 and gave five stars, but I still had a good time with it and will continue my project of collecting all of Simak’s books in their vintage janky paperback editions. Special Deliverance was once of the last books Simak published before his death, and it does bear the hallmarks of a later work in his career, with a revisiting of themes, and a bit of tiredness in sections of the plot (something […]

“Maybe compassion and empathy are just squishy emotions. Illusions created by our mirror neurons. But does it really matter where they come from? They make us human. They might be what make us worth saving.”

Upgrade by Blake Crouch

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This hit the spot. Sometimes you just need a book you can zoom through. Short chapters, intriguing and freaky plot, simple prose, high stakes. Blake Crouch always delivers. I think I like this book less than Dark Matter but more than Recursion. It helped that for once there were zero nuclear bombs present. This takes place in the near future, when genetic research and technology has been banned almost completely, excepting a few highly regulated government sponsored programs, due to a disaster caused by genetic […]



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