Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Ugh, I’m still thinking about the thing with the hamsters.

Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell

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30 Books in 30 Days, Vol. 3 Book 3/30 I figured out about half of what was going on here before it was revealed, but it didn’t matter because this book was really well written. This is only my second book by Lisa Jewell, and she is two for two (both books about teenagers who have disappeared, and they have another similarity as well but that’s spoilers). I read this in a day, staying up two hours past my bedtime to finish it (and my […]

“Our minds do this all the time. They talk us out of things we don’t want to know.”

Gone Tonight by Sarah Pekkanen

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Thanks to Macmillan Audio for the unsolicited audio ARC. It hasn’t affected the contents of my review. The blurb makes this one sound really interesting, which is why I accepted the ARC from the publisher. Catherine’s mother Ruth has been newly diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s, but some odd incidents lead Catherine to look into her mother’s past—their shared past—and secrets come spilling out not only regarding where her mother came from, but what her mother is doing current day, and even her medical diagnosis. […]

CBR BINGO – SEX: Never meet your heroes.

The Writing Retreat by Julia Bartz

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This book was wild, and I actually really enjoyed it! I love books that go down deep into the id, and I love books that talk about writing and the creative process, and this did both of those things very well. I really only have a couple reasons for lowering this book to 3.5 stars, but that’s for later. First, the title is pretty accurate here, it’s a book about a writing retreat. Four (now five for some mysterious reason) young women writers have been […]

“Small talk with the dragon. How are you? Eaten any adventurers lately? Sure, just had one this morning. Look, I still got his femur stuck in my teeth. Is that upsetting to you?”

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Well, everyone was right. This was great, and the marketing/art department at Avon should be shamed heavily for the way they did this book and this entire series dirty*. I imagine there are many, many readers who would enjoy this book, and presumably the rest of the series, if the covers weren’t a) heinously misrepresenting the contents of the story, and b) butt ugly and embarrassing. I was one of those readers! And then people whose tastes I trust kept pushing them on me until […]

Dan Brown Writing Victor Hugo would need a CW

The Watchers by Jon Steele

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Bingo 15: Violence The Watchers, had it been better known, would likely have faced bans for the violence, the sex, and the use of religion. I was also a little surprised there was no CW; it kind of needs one given how graphic certain parts of the story get in terms of the sexual and standard violence, some suggested but an awful lot directly shown, especially the last 100 pages or so. Basically, The Watchers is what I image you’d get if Dan Brown had […]

Constructive Criticism

The Last Word by Taylor Adams

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CBR 15 Bingo – You Are Here: The setting is incredibly self-contained, with nearly all of the action taking place in the same isolated house on a beach. After Emma leaves a negative review on a self-published book, she discovers that some authors take such things very, very personally. I picked up this book because it amused me that someone would take the unfortunately true tales of authors coming after readers who’ve left negative reviews on their books (generally online, but at least in one case physically) and write […]



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