Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A Great First (Long) Book in a (Long) Series

City of Golden Shadow by Tad Williams

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After carrying this book around from apartment to apartment for thirteen years, I finally made it beyond the first hundred pages and have finished the first book in the quartet. At this pace, I should be done in about 39 more years, so there’s hope! I think this really is a case of a book needing to be read at the right time. With a long train commute and a sudden urge to read Tad Williams, the stars aligned. City of Golden Shadow is set in […]

What if your worst enemy designed a videogame death trap for you and then placed you inside it? But he was also incompetent?

An Unwelcome Quest (Magic 2.0, #3) by Scott Meyer

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First of all, this is one of the rare series that if you’re going to read it, you have to do the audio. You’re just missing something truly ineffable if you don’t. And I guess if you’re one of those people who can’t do audiobooks, then I don’t know what to tell you. I think I would have subtracted an entire star from all of these books without Luke Daniels’ performance. He brings a certain majesty of attitude and snarkiness, to these very silly stories. […]

I had so much fun listening to this. Sometimes you just need nerd fluff.

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Martin Banks is a jackass. That’s all I kept thinking during the first half or so of this book. To be clear, my thinking the main character was a jackass in no way hindered my enjoyment of the story. In fact, I’m fairly certain the book encouraged that opinion. See, one day Martin is sitting at home being lazy, hacking websites just for the fun of it (he sees himself as a benevolent hacker, because he doesn’t cause any harm–he just likes doing it) when […]

This book is the oil; I’m the water. No mixy good together.

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Straight up, I did not like this book. It’s not quite worthy of the one star treatment, though, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, because the actual construction of his sentences, the literal writing, is not bad. Second, because the underlying story remains one I think interesting to explore in book form. And third, because I truly believe that one star ratings should be reserved for books that really go beyond the pale in their awfulness, not just slapping that on there because I didn’t happen […]

Brandon Sanderson goes meta.

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So the other day, B-Sand just decided to drop this surprise novella on us, and SURPRISE, it was surprising. I downloaded it immediately. I went into it blind, and at first, I wasn’t really very into it. It takes a little bit before you have your bearings enough to realize that no, this isn’t just yet another magical world he’s created with yet another magical system that didn’t seem all that distinct. I was particularly worried when his narrator (a first person narrator) starts talking […]



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