women’s fiction – Cannonball Read 17

People who live in glass houses shouldn’t host baby showers on broiling hot days

So Thrilled For You (2025) by Holly Bourne

April 10, 2025 by drmllz Leave a Comment

Content note: Do NOT read this book or this review if you have any sort of trauma related to childbirth, motherhood, or (in)fertility. So Thrilled For You is about a group of four women who were housemates at university in England, whose bond has become somewhat strained, but who are coming together for a happy occasion–Nicki’s baby shower. Charlotte (paging SATC) is the perfectionist organising the shower to the fullest of its glossy filtered #humbleandblessed social media potential; Lauren is dealing with postpartum depression and a […]

If your therapist started writing chick-lit, this is what you’d get.

Things You Save In A Fire by Katherine Center

June 18, 2022 by RaRaGabor Leave a Comment

This is the second Katherine Center book I’ve read. My book club read How To Walk Away a couple years ago. It was fine! Not my usual cup of tea, but we actually had a good discussion around disability, the ethics that therapists should/do follow, etc. I thought Things You Save In A Fire might be a good addition for the Beach Reads presentation that I’m doing for work. Cassie Hanwell is a 26 year old fire fighter. She’s also a rising star in the […]

“[She] knew that this was her life. Better to be immersed in it than to see it from afar.”

Some Luck by Jane Smiley

June 9, 2022 by GentleRain Leave a Comment

I really enjoy this book and I think this is my second or third time reading it. Some Luck follows the Langdon family, who start off as farmers in Iowa. Each chapter is one year in their lives, and that concept makes this book very readable, as it moves along at a fast pace. This is the first book in a trilogy and covers 1920 to 1953. I think the thing that makes this book more than a gimmick is Jane Smiley’s beautiful prose — there are […]

“I felt that I was now old enough to become fussy and spinsterish if I wanted to:” A Gentle Post-War Comedy of Manners

Excellent Women by Barbara Pym

June 3, 2022 by GentleRain Leave a Comment

This is a fast read but it has a lot of depth to it. I enjoyed it and it was the kind of book that surprises you and is counter to what you were expecting, in a good way. Excellent Women was a little outside of my normal reading pattern in that I’m not always a literary fiction type person, but this turned out to be more of a comedy of manners novel than the literary accolades suggested. And it’s good to broaden one’s reading […]

Runaway…

Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple

July 11, 2019 by Classic Leave a Comment

Wow. So this book bounced all over the place and my brain still feels fizzy because there was a lot of things going on, but boy did I love this book! I loved Bernadette, Bee, their weird dog Ice Cream, and I loved the emails and letters between two women who I would have throttled if I ever met in real life (Audrey Griffin and Soo-Lin). This book was in parts funny and sad and back to funny again. I picked this because I wanted […]

The Murder Subplot Didn’t Work

The Last Time I Was Me by Cathy Lamb

February 22, 2019 by Classic Leave a Comment

Yeah, I know you are like well this looks like a good book, well it was except for a whole murder subplot that put it in a different category in my mind. It also at times didn’t feel realistic with what I would imagine would happen in real life with regards to Jeanne’s trial for assault of her ex boyfriend. I think I was highly amused by certain parts of the book and at times thought that Lamb had some bad messaging in here. “The […]

Zirza on A Gothic Classic for a ReasonIt's one of those wish-you-could-read-it-again-for-the-first-time books. I loved it.
Emmalita on “It came to something when you found yourself hoping that the footsteps you heard were ghosts.”I loved the ending! I don’t think it’s been out long enough to talk about why though.
Dixie on Track Her Down by Melinda LeighI am just starting Track Her Down and I have read them all in order till now and thought I...
Roland of Gilead on How can you give us the gift of a crazy character named Rando Thoughtful and then just as suddenly take that gift away? We need to talk, Uncle Stevie.I came across this randomly years after it was written because I was searching "Random Thoughtful. But I have the...
Emmalita on “Only you, Em, would refer to heartbreak as a distraction. I think I would have a more sympathetic response if I asked to marry a bookcase.”Oh my goodness, Gallifrey was beautiful. I’m sure her mittens were gloriously murdery.

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