Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Home Is a Lonely, Wind-Lashed Isle

The Lost Lights of St Kilda by Elisabeth Gifford

by Leave a Comment

‘I had no idea where we were headed, no idea what lay before us. All I knew was I was ready to travel the length and breadth of France if the world would give me one more chance to spend one more hour with you – to say I’m sorry.’ In 1927, Cambridge student Fred ends up on the remote Scottish island of St Kilda to study the local rock formations and falls in love with Chrissie, a local woman. Thirteen years later, he is […]

When History Repeats itself

They Called Us Enemy by George Takei

by Leave a Comment

#crb11bingo #TrueStory I am going to write WOW 200 times and OMG for the other 50 words. I am also going to say this the second draft of my review. I found myself just going on about all the little, amazing details to the story. I was near 500 words and could have written another 500. They Called Us Enemy is George Takei’s story in a graphic novel format. Along with Justin Eisinger, Steven Scott and Harmony Becker the reader sees the years from early/mid-1940s […]

Must-read historical fiction.

The Huntress by Kate Quinn

by Leave a Comment

CBR11 Bingo – History/Schmistory   After reading Quinn’s previous novel, The Alice Network, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on her new book. I adore her way of portraying women in historical fiction – finding the badass women who are the heroines of the story, not the background players. One part of this story follows the journey of Nina Markova, as she journeys from the wilds of the Soviet Union to Moscow, in order to join the Night Witches – a legendary group of […]

A badass female spy network? What’s not to love?!

The Alice Network by Kate Quinn

by Leave a Comment

CBR11 Bingo – Far and Away   This category is a bit broad, but hopefully a novel set on a different continent in a different time period is far enough away? 🙂 The Alice Network starts off with American co-ed Charlotte (Charlie) St. Clair travelling to Europe to get “a little problem” taken care of (1947 translation: she done got knocked up out of wedlock and her wealthy parents are insisting on an abortion in Switzerland). Charlie’s motivations for agreeing to the trip to Europe […]

As always, the book is better than the movie.

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows

by Leave a Comment

Despite so many people raving about this book, and seeing that Netflix had even got on board by making a movie, I kept shuffling it down my pile. Not sure why (weirdly, I think I was partially turned off by the long and clunky title), but I picked it up this spring  on a Saturday morning, intending to read a chapter or two…. but was immediately hooked and read the entire thing in one sitting. It is set in England just after the end of […]

A Nazi, a Fascist, a Communist, a novelist, a countrywoman, and a Duchess walk into a bar-and I don’t know what happened because I didn’t finish the book

by 2 Comments

I hate quitting on books. Hate. It. Because I’m a fast reader, I can usually convince myself to stick with my read. But I white-knuckled my way through about 100 pages of “The Six: The Lives of the Mitford Sisters” before I finally tossed it and moved on. Life’s too short. I’d never heard of the Mitford Sisters before but I guess they’re pretty famous. They were socialites who managed to deliver more drama than the Kardashians. Beautiful, witty, articulate and unpredictable, they were at […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo