I’m going to start this review like an online recipe: by providing a long back-story that is not relevant to why you are here.
I have always been an avid reader and have dabbled a bit with writing. Several years ago, I attempted to participate in the Cannonball Read.
I posted exactly one review.
My problem was two-fold. One, the Pajiba crowd seems so well-read, articulate, witty, and generally smarter then me. This left me feeling intimidated, as though my reviews would be ‘I liked this book. It was good.’ in comparison. And two, navigating the actual posting of reviews seemed impossible. I’m in my forties but I have the computer literacy of a grandmother. I learned how to use a PC in the 90s when the only other people I knew with email addresses were other students at my college. Honestly, I’m not much better at accessing all the capabilities of my phone. I’m using the phone to post this review and I’m super impressed with myself just for figuring out how to attach a photo! (I’m going to laugh if I click publish and the photo is nowhere to be found.)
This year, on a whim, I thought I’d try participating again. I read MsWas and Emmalita’s tips and then something just clicked in my brain. I thought: who cares if I sound like an uneducated dummy? No one else I know IRL likes to read as much as I do. And they don’t read the same types of books I read anyway. The Cannonball Readers are my people. I must join them!
So now, after all that needless information, I’ll start actually talking about Tuesday Mooney Talks to Ghosts.
I liked this book. It was good.
Tuesday Mooney is a prospect researcher for a hospital, meaning she researches and profiles rich people and then passes the information to others who try to get said rich people to donate money to the hospital.
At a fundraiser, one of the rich people (an eccentric billionaire of course) keels over and dies. His obituary announces a treasure hunt throughout Boston, with the winner gaining a portion of the billionaire’s wealth. If this sounds Ready Player One-esque, it is a bit, but only superficially. Instead of 80s references within a video game, this reads like an elaborate scavenger hunt. The addition that I really enjoyed was Tuesday conversing with her deceased childhood friend. Unless there were clues I missed, you’re left not knowing if Tuesday is truly communicating with a dead person or expressing trauma over the friend’s disappearance.
I found this book a lot of fun to read. There’s a gay best friend who keeps sabatoging his relationships, a shy teenage neighbor, cosplay, daddy issues, a hottie potential heir who’s weirdly suspicious. Like I said, just generally a fun read. I don’t know that I could say the book really wowed me, but it’s definitely well-written and subject matter that a lot of people could enjoy. If I were the type of person to lend my books to others, this would be one I would share.
Here ends review number one. I have five other books read for which I have not yet written reviews or even jotted down any quick thoughts. Let’s hope I do better at posting than last time!
