Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A collection that’s a little all over the place, but wholly enjoyable

Hex Life by Christopher Golden, Rachel Autumn Deering

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I do not think I am the target reader for a short story. I value stories that have complete resolutions. I want characters that have had the chance to rise and fall, succeed and fail, and sometimes more than once. These things are not always the aim of a short story. I get that, and yet I keep going back to these collections. This is one of the first collections that I have read that are all written by different authors. Though each story centers […]

My Soul to Take – Tananarive Due (2011)

My Soul to Take by Tananarive Due

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The final novel of the African Immortals series (or I suppose, final so far), and apparently, though I didn’t know it going in, a sequel as well to Due’s other book, Joplin’s Ghost. Phoenix is a now retired musician/singer who is approached by Johnny Wright with a proposal. He works for a large corporation that has recently achieved a large amount of scrutiny and infamy as the producer of “glow” what is seen from the outside as a new drug that is both promoted as […]

“I know what’s best for you” is insulting for anyone over three years old

My Soul to Keep by Tananarive Due

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This one is basically an allegory about an abusive marriage, but it went to some interesting places. Dawit/David is immortal. He was made immortal by Khaldun hundreds of years ago in what would become Ethiopia. He can be hurt, but he heals. He can die, but he comes back the next morning. He’s lived multiple lifetimes, married, fathered children, learned different careers and languages. Currently, he’s married to a reporter named Jessica, with a five-year-old daughter named Kira. With this version of family, he’s actually […]

Blood Colony – Tananarive Due (2008)

Blood Colony by Tananarive Due

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As with the third book of almost any series, it’s hard to write about this one without getting into the plot. One thing that happened almost immediately in the transition between the first and second book, and now the second and third book is that the world has been allowed to move forward without us. This is something that takes patience as a writer, and as a reader. We’re given plenty of information to catch us back up, but we’re also treated with respect. So […]

The Living Blood – Tananarrive Due (2002)

The Living Blood by Tananarive Due

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Book one of this series spent a lot of time in split narratives (and narrative perspectives), mostly through dramatic irony and flashback. We were getting both Jessica and David, David knowing everything about Jessica, and Jessica knowing almost nothing about David. We also got a lot about David’s past through flashback. For this novel, a few years past the first, we have a much wider range of characters, landscapes and even mini-genre styles. At times this still reads like an Anne Rice vampire novel, but […]

My Soul to Keep – Tananarive Due (1997)

My Soul to Keep by Tananarive Due

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This is one of those books that’s sort of always been around in my reading consciousness. It came out when I was in high school, and being a big Stephen King fan, and being new to figuring out what books to read on my own, it came across my radar and has stuck with me sense. I’m finally reading it, after reading a different Due book a year or so ago, and it’s actually a lot different than I thought. I had it in my […]



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