Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“my life will change utterly since my sinful eyes saw this noble land so much admired.”

Tombland: A Matthew Shardlake Tudor Mystery by C.J. Sansom

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Never in England were there so many gentlemen and so little gentleness. After two years working for Elizabeth on legal land matters, Matthew Shardlake is summoned in front of her. Edith Boleyn, a wife of a distant relation has been recently murdered, and her husband, John Boleyn, is on trial for it. As Elizabeth is fiercely protective of any relation of hers due to being unable to save her mother (seriously, I get the feeling from this book that if Elizabeth thought it would have […]

“Politics is like dice: the better the player, the worse the man”

Heartstone: A Matthew Shardlake Tudor Mystery by C.J. Sansom

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It’s 1545 and Henry VII has gotten England into a war with France; seeing as it’s Tudor-Era England, war with France, Spain, Scotland, or England itself is not really that surprising. It looks like the French will land their invasion force at Portsmouth. Too bad that Portsmouth is around the area Matthew Shardlake is being sent by his patron, Queen Catherine Parr. A servant in Parr’s former household has come to the Queen for assistance; the servant’s son has allegedly killed himself after swearing out […]

“Have you ever thought what a God would be like who actually ordained and executed the cruelty that is in [the biblical Book of Revelation]? A holocaust of mankind. Yet so many of these Bible-men accept the idea without a second thought.”

Revelation by C.J. Sansom

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This was probably the weirdest (and creepiest) book in the series so far. The motivation behind the murders is unfortunately still around today, and I enjoyed the Tudor take on the movie Seven (though having never seen the movie, I am just guessing at that comparison). I also appreciated how well-researched the book is, and how realistically all the characters are written; though Shardlake and his “crush on a woman who is going to kick him in the teeth” per book is starting to get […]

“How easy it is to leave things undone until they are too late.”

Sovereign: A Matthew Shardlake Tudor Mystery by C.J. Sansom

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In my love affair for both Historical Murder Mysteries and series whose books get progressively more brick-like the longer they go on, I tackled Sovereign, the third in the Matthew Shardlake Tudor Mystery series. And I don’t really regret that I did. Set this time in York during the great Progress Henry VIII took after the near civil war of 1541, York truly comes alive, with the Minster and St. Mary’s Church shown particular love. Sansom paints a pretty good picture of how as much […]

To Vigil the Ante

Even the Wicked by Lawrence Block

Revelation by CJ Sansom

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Just as with Trump’s election last month dovetailing into subjects I read, the recent shooting death of healthcare CEO Brian Thompson by a vigilante killer coincided with me reading two consecutive books on vigilante justice. Going to review both vis-a-vis how they speak to the moment. Even the Wicked Growing up, vigilante justice was always right wing coded. Dirty Harry. Death Wish. I still remember the popular “Beer For My Horses” song in which Willie Nelson and Toby Keith talk about public hangings and “putting […]

Early Fall Leftovers

To Start A War: How the Bush Administration Took Us Into Iraq by Robert Draper

The Travelers by Chris Pavone

A Walk Among the Tombstones by Lawrence Block

Dark Fire by CJ Sansom

The Menendez Murders: The Shocking Untold Story of the Menendez Family and the Killings that Stunned the Nation by Robert Rand

Stasi Child by David Young

The Cover Wife by Dan Fesperman

So Thirsty by Rachel Harrison

Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of Norwich

Geiger by Gustaf Skördeman

Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 by Steve Coll

Slow Horses by Mick Herron

The Devil Knows You're Dead by Lawrence Block

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I’ve read some interesting stuff lately and I wish I had made more time to document it but life gets in the way that life sometimes does. Not all bad, just life. To Start A War**** I had a long thing here about connecting this to the 2024 election but I don’t want to talk current electoral politics on here, at least the specifics of them. A good book if you want to know the intelligence (ha) perspective of how we wound up in a […]



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