Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Do I like YA fantasy again???

This Vicious Grace (The Last Finestra, #1) by Emily Thiede

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Thanks to Macmillan Audio, Macmillan Young Readers, and NetGalley for the ARC. It hasn’t affected the content of my review. Well, this was an impulse request on NetGalley, and despite some complaints (mostly centered around this being a debut, I think), overall I did like this and I will be reading the sequel. The premise here is that our main character Alessa is a Chosen One, but she’s kinda sucky at it, and she’s lonely and miserable. She is the Finestra (Italian for “Window,” which […]

I love everything this book chooses to be. #CBRBINGO – Font

Iron Widow (Iron Widow, #1) by Xiran Jay Zhao

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“How do you take the fight out of half the population and render them willing slaves? You tell them they’re meant to do nothing but serve from the minute they’re born. You tell them they’re weak. You tell them they’re prey. You tell them over and over, until it’s the only truth they’re capable of living.” This book is a scream of rage into the night, and I’m so glad it got published. Even if you don’t normally read YA, I would urge you to […]

“In the secret code of flowers”

Enola Holmes: The Graphic Novels: The Case of the Missing Marquess, The Case of the Left-Handed Lady, and The Case of the Bizarre Bouquets by Serena Blasco

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After her mother disappears, Enola Holmes runs away from her brothers, the famous Sherlock and Mycroft, and falls into solving mysteries in Victorian London. I have of course seen the promos for the Netflix film Enola Holmes, though I haven’t actually seen it yet. I knew it was based on a series of YA books, but I’d never read them either. So when I saw that there was a graphic novel adaptation on NetGalley, I thought it would a fun introduction. Besides, I like the […]

“If she closed her eyes she might fix this in her memory always: the pulse in Kath’s throat; the warmth of her body; the scent of her skin.”

Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo

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In Last Night at the Telegraph Club Malinda Lo created National Book Award for Young People’s Literature winner which aims to challenge pervasive perceptions of the 1950s in the United States, including stereotypes about Chinese Americans, the invisibility of the lesbian and gay community, and the role of women in the space program, and the reach of Red Scare paranoia on people’s day to day lives. It is also the story of two young women falling in love during their senior year of high school […]

DNA app as plot device.

You Have a Match by Emma Lord

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30 Books in 30 Days, Vol. 2 Book 6/30 Reading this right after Perfect on Paper was probably a mistake, because I couldn’t help comparing the two of them, to this book’s detriment. But I don’t think this would have been a full four-star book for me, anyway. Parts of it I really liked, even loved, but then too much would happen all at once, and things got messy, and then were wrapped up very neatly. It just wasn’t as satisfying as it could have been. […]

Yes, Darcy, you are queer!

Perfect on Paper by Sophie Gonzales

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30 Books in 30 Days, Vol. 2 Book 5/30 I haven’t read a really solid, really good bordering on great contemporary YA novel in what feels like a really long time. Actually, I just scrolled back through my GR reading challenges, and the last really good/great YA contemporary I read was Concrete Rose back in January 2021. So it has been a while! Perfect on Paper isn’t life-changing or anything, it’s just a really well done YA novel, a classic of the form. It certainly […]



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