Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“Happiness is a garden walled with glass: there’s no way in or out. In Paradise there are no stories, because there are no journeys. It’s loss and regret and misery and yearning that drive the story forward, along its twisted road.”

The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood

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In another time or another headspace, I might have given this five stars. If I ever re-read, I probably will. Unfortunately, my brain was just not in the mood for a long, measured, thoughtful, historical literary fiction novel when I read this back in April (!). I should probably have done the audiobook instead. (Anyone know if it’s any good? I’ve never heard of the narrator before.) *Have I EVER been in the mood for a Margaret Atwood? 🤔 I somehow managed to read The […]

Time rises and rises, and when it reaches the level of your eyes you drown.

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“Having long ago whispered I want to die, I now realize that this wish will indeed be fulfilled, and sooner rather than later. No matter that I’ve changed my mind about it.” Atwood, having once written the Handmaid’s tale can do no wrong in my eyes. I trust her to the end of the Earth and back. And much of this book, I’ll admit, had to be read on that trust. This is not a whirlpool of a book, nowhere does is suck you in, […]

Perception and Remembrance

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The Blind Assassin is Margaret Atwood’s Booker Prize and Dashiell Hammet Award winning novel (2000) that spans the major events of the 20th century while telling the tragic story of the Chase sisters. It is an ingenious combination of history and mystery with love, infidelity, avarice, godliness, war and literary references woven deftly within. This is also a novel about women, class and perception, or misperception/blindness as the case may be. The novel is narrated by Iris Chase Griffen, daughter and wife of captains of […]



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