Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“When it seems like brown lives don’t matter “

Barely Missing Everything by Matt Mendez

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Barely Missing Everything has a few bumps and bruises in the writing style and subject matter. Matt Mendez has a “this a not an easy read” story for several reasons. First, the points of view can be a little off putting, though they are usually from Juan’s and the subject is how the town Juan, his family, and friends lives in treats people with Mexican backgrounds. Clichés and stereotypes come up often with what happens to the characters (Juan mother is a teenage mom, Juan’s […]

Hey Hey He’s Okay…!

A-Okay by Jarad Green

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A-Okay by Jarad Green seemed like it might have a slightly different take on the coming-of-age story. However, it turned more into a “boy doing the coming-of-age things like you would see a girl doing in a book.” In other words, a normal coming-of-age story. It is what everyone has had to deal with while navigating eighth grade. There is personal care, dealing with flaws real and imagined, trying new looks, hurting friends’ feelings, making new friends, and dealing with insecurities. We have seen it […]

Hitting you in the feels

The Wishing Balloons by Jonathan D. Voss

Where Butterflies Fill the Sky: A Story of Immigration, Family, and Finding Home by Zahra Marwan

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When I do a picture book review post I try and put the same theme together. Does not always work of course, but this time, I am putting together two books that gave feels. Or will give feels to the reader. Both books have a message, are soft but strong and know how to tug at the ol’ emotions. In many ways, we have seen these messages to distractions. It is their illustrations that give them fresh tones. The Wishing Balloons is a thoughtful and […]

Two books two reviews part two

I’m on It! (Elephant & Piggie Like Reading) by Andrea Tsurumi

Guess What!? (an Unlimited Squirrels Book) by Mo Willems

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What do you do when you have four books and are not sure you can do the 250-word reviews for them? Well, if you read the other two book review I did you know that you write about them in groups of two. This time we will start with the one I liked the least out of these two. However, I’m on It! (Elephant & Piggie Like Reading) is not a book I disliked. Perhaps the repetition of the concept was a little grating after […]

When Boy Meets Boy and Sparks fly….maybe

Heartstopper V01 by Alice Oseman

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I have tried multiple times to start the first book in the Heartstopper series. However, I learned that my trick of “starting on a random page to see if it can grab me” did not work. This book is one you must start with page one and work your way through it. And actually, one should read it slowly as, even though there is little text, and frankly little traditional action, you do not want to rush it. There is a lot going on and […]

This book is fudging (only I didn’t say fudge) messed up! But … I think I liked it

Psychotic by Jacques Mathis

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Psychotic by Jacques Mathis is a, “What the Flying Monkey did I just read,” read. With Sylvian Dorange illustrating this splintered, crazy, odd, all over the place graphic novel, Mathis tells his own story. It is a story of one man’s madness, and the journey he takes to try and put himself back together again. Yet, some days, if what we see on the page is the real type of things he experienced during his manic episodes, it is a miracle is did not stay […]



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