Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A tense, haunting, and beautifully written thriller

Those Who Wish Me Dead by Michael Koryta

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He thought he could get them. He didn’t understand who they were, though. What they were. She could see them again and, worse, hear them, those calm voices in a beautiful, still night. Could smell the old smoke and the old blood. Then the fresh versions that followed. She prayed for her husband then, prayed that he would not meet them, would not hear them, would not smell them. It felt too late, though. She’d slept too long, and he’d made his choice too early. […]

Which is scarier, a blizzard catching you unprepared or driving through it with five strangers?

Five Total Strangers by Natalie D. Richards

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Mira is flying home for Christmas. Her family has been through a lot recently, and even though she’s only a teenager, Mira carries the weight of making sure everyone (namely her mother) is okay. Unfortunately, her connecting flight to Pittsburgh is cancelled due to an impending blizzard. She’s not that far from home and she’s desperate. Luckily, her neighbor on her first flight, Harper, is renting a car and will be driving through Pittsburgh, so Mira hops into a car with Harper and three other […]

Paula Hawkins third novel is her best one yet.

A Slow Fire Burning by Paula Hawkins

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Daniel Sutherland is found viciously murdered aboard his houseboat on the dock of a London canal by Miriam, an older woman on a neighboring boat. A troubled young woman, Laura, was seen leaving the docks covered in blood, and the police quickly zero in on her as the suspect, despite the fact they cannot find the murder weapon. Soon the people that best knew Daniel are pulled into orbit with one another and long-simmering resentment will erupt into a conflagration.  Motive is the question that […]

What the Rich Do in the Shadows

The Missing Hours by Julia Dahl

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___Nesting here for major triggers___     cn. the book itself describes the after effects of rape, revenge porn and other means of violence. If any of that is triggering or problematic for you, sit this one out. I grabbed Julia Dahl’s new standalone The Missing Hours on a bit of a whim. I read an interview she gave on the invaluable website crimereads.com and it seemed interesting. I had read The Invisible City a few years ago and enjoyed it well enough for a freshman effort so I […]

“Winter mornings are made of steel; they have a metallic taste and sharp edges. On a Wednesday in January, at seven in the morning, it’s plain to see that the world was not made for Man, and definitely not for his comfort or pleasure.”

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk, Antonia Lloyd-Jones (translator)

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The Reading Women Challenge for 2021 (its last year, as it turns out) contains two challenges which surprisingly caused me some consternation – I didn’t have anything in my nearly 600 book deep to read list that was a book written by an Eastern European woman and/or a crime novel or thriller in translation. I spent time on and off all year hunting up a book that could work for both – it had to be out there and the whole point of this is […]

Screen-To-Page

Final Girls by Riley Sager

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My second Riley Sager book and I think I understand now why I’m coming around to his work… He’s the Lee Child of these kinds of thrillers. I kind of mean that as a compliment (he says with some trepidation in his voice). Child is far from my favorite author and I find Jack Reacher to be a stereotypical character in broad strokes. But Child is a talented writer who knows how to craft a thriller. Every book is the same yet the story still […]



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