Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A surprisingly educational celebrity autobiography

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah

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In this very engaging autobiography, Trevor Noah opens up about growing up in South Africa, born from a black Xhosa mother and a white Swiss father at a time when this was literally a crime punishable with several years in prison. The Apartheid regime ended while Noah was still young, but his childhood was still deeply affected by the fact that he was a mixed race child in a society where the races were not supposed to mix at all, to the point where his […]

A Horrifying Look at Apartheid from the Inside

Born a Crime by Trevor Noah

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I’ve had this book sitting on my Kindle for a while now but finally got around to reading it.  Trevor Noah is a great storyteller and the book is organised into chapters around events that have the same theme or are just based on a specific event.   Each chapter/vignette is prefaced by a factual couple of pages explaining the context for what is about to follow.  For example there is a long story occurring when Trevor is in his late teens that is centered around […]

Want to fall in love with Trevor Noah?

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I’d read good things about this book for a little while but I assumed it was just another comedian celebrity writing a book to make some money.  Since I usually spend money on those exact books, I bought this with one of my first Audible credits.  I’ve always thought that comedians who read their own books are the very best of narrators so it seemed like a safe pick.  I’d watched the Daily Show with Trevor a few times.  A little less often than I […]

Yes, this memoir is as good as everyone says.

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If you like audiobooks at all, I would suggest doing this by audio. I know I enjoyed it a lot more than I would have reading in another format because Trevor Noah narrates it himself, and his voices for everyone are very charming. There’s also something very satisfying about hearing someone tell stories about their life in their own voice. This book is made up of a series of interconnected stories about his youth in South Africa, from when he was “born a crime,” with […]

Context and Choices

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My uncle, an occasional Cannonballer, sent me Trevor Noah’s Born a Crime and an awesome coffee mug for Christmas. I was delighted. I love reading and drinking coffee. The beginning of the year turned out to be incredibly stressful and I struggled to focus on reading. I finally made it though. I read the book and then I immediately reread the book. It’s so good. Noah introduces each new section or story with a page or two of historical context. The context is necessary to understand […]

A Personal View into Life under and after Apartheid

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In an effort to try to get into Audio books, I crowd sourced the FB group for recommendations, and this had a large number of glowing recommendations.  I quite liked it, and it helped that I had a three hour drive to complete when I started the book.  I still struggle a bit with focusing on audiobooks when not in a car so I may have missed a few minor details but overall, I really enjoyed this book. I remember vaguely learning about South Africa […]



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