Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Different tune, same story

Battle of the Bands by Eric Smith and Lauren Gibaldi

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There’s a thing that happens when you totally crush out on someone. It’s like you can feel your heartbeat in every part of your body. There’s a euphoric kind of excitement mixed with sadness and terror. It’s hard to explain, but it happens in an instant and then just explodes and grows from there, consuming your every waking thought and sometimes your dreams. You can’t escape from it. It takes over and runs the controls that make you . . . you. Suddenly, you aren’t […]

Incredible world-building does not make up for a lackluster romance

Before We Disappear by Shaun David Hutchinson

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“I think it must’ve been a person who’d wished for love but had never known it who’d created the first clock. Because time is a reminder of how quickly the present passes and how little of the future remains, and no one in love would want to know that.” ― Shaun David Hutchinson, Before We Disappear After narrowly escaping Paris when his employer/adoptive mother is accused of stealing a rival’s illusion, Jack finds himself in Seattle the month before the 1909 Alaska–Yukon–Pacific Exposition. While there, […]

The Prestige, but with teenagers and in the Pacific Northwest

Before We Disappear by Shaun David Hutchinson

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My entire frustration with this book is how nonsensical characters’ decisions are. The plot itself is an engaging one, for all that it mimics the beats of The Prestige (side note: basically the entire cast of that movie ended up being superheros or were already). There’s also a lovely, liberal dose of diversity of both race and sexual identity, and while the former has some period appropriate side eye the latter is barely looked at twice. But! A warm and fuzzy 1901 where Black and […]

“One night. I just want one night of sleep”…”Is it that too much to to ask? One night where I don’t have to babysit or dig up a corpse?…”

The Past and Other Things That Should Stay Buried by Shaun David Hutchinson

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Part of my Simon and Schuster publisher online finds included The Past and Other Things That Should Stay Buried by Shaun David Hutchinson. A mouthful of a title that almost hides the plot of this young adult novel. The Past is a messy, quirky, simple and a modern teen novel. Even the unlikable characters can be likable. This is mostly since you can sympathize with what is going on, even if you have never been a reanimated, dead, best ex-friend. (Images are three of the […]

“The apocalypse began at Starbucks. Where else did you expect the end of the world to start?”

The Apocalypse of Elena Mendoza by Shaun David Hutchinson

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#CBR11bingo – #cannonballersays Elena Mendoza is a totally normal high school student. She has a best friend named Fadil, an ex named Javi, a job at the local Starbucks, and a crush on the mysterious and beautiful Freddie. Oh, and also, Elena was born without her mother ever having had sex, leading to the EXTREMELY clever nickname “Mary” at school. And she hears voices from inanimate objects that tell her what to do all the time. One day, while Elena is busy at Starbucks, the […]

“Now we have the opportunity to start over and try to do better this time around.”

The Apocalypse of Elena Mendoza by Hutchinson, Shaun David

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Elena Mendoza is called “Mary” at school, because she was the product of a virgin birth and her classmates are cruel idiots. Other than that factoid, her life is fairly routine: a shitty first boyfriend, an unrequited crush on her beautiful classmate Freddie, a deadbeat stepdad and overworked mom, and now a typical teen job at the local Starbucks. Oh wait, except that Elena has also been hearing voices most of her life – voices from random otherwise inanimate logos, toys, and statues. And today, […]



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