Cannonball Read 9

Sticking it to Cancer One Book at a Time

Grim, with a side of bleak

Broken Harbor by Tana French

by 5 Comments

  Unfortunately, I think I might be changing my mind about Tana French. I loved The Secret Place, but nothing since then has held up. I know my literary tastes tend to be a little on the pedestrian side, but I would like a few more loose ends tied up, and a little bit more of a happy ending. Detective Kennedy and his newbie partner Detective Curran (I listened to the audio book, sorry if I’m misspelling things) are assigned a case, the brutal slaying of an entire family. The crime took place in a spooky, half-completed subdivision that was […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Purchase Broken Harbor by Tana French or any item from amazon via our link.

Funds raised are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name.

Share the post "Grim, with a side of bleak"

5/11/2017 | 's CBR9 Review No:12 |

Questing with snakes

Dreamsnake by Vonda McIntyre

by 2 Comments

This one was recommended by fellow Cannonballers/Pajibans when I requested help finding women sci-fi writers, and I am so glad! It was post-apocalyptic and interesting and original. I had read some McIntyre before, but not this one. Snake is a healer, traveling around and helping people in villages that are too small to have their own resident healer. She works with three snakes, using their poison to combat cancers or other diseases, and using the ultra-rare dreamsnake to ease pain until the end in the cases she can’t cure. When her dreamsnake is killed by a panicked villager, she sets […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Purchase Dreamsnake by Vonda McIntyre or any item from amazon via our link.

Funds raised are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name.

Share the post "Questing with snakes"

5/2/2017 | 's CBR9 Review No:11 |

Totally biased, totally proud

Sara's Station by Tom Howard

by 5 Comments

Full disclosure: my dad (fellow Cannonballer sabian30) wrote this book! I’m so excited. He’s had so many short stories published I’ve lost count and has his very own Amazon author page, but now he’s got an officially official book! So I’m aware that I’m completely biased, but I thought the book was great. Dad grew up reading all the science fiction he could find, and he’s always been fond of Andre Norton. Sara’s Station is his take on a Norton-style story. I’ve read a few of hers, but probably not enough to catch every single in-joke. However, I do think […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Purchase Sara's Station by Tom Howard or any item from amazon via our link.

Funds raised are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name.

Share the post "Totally biased, totally proud"

4/17/2017 | 's CBR9 Review No:10 |

Haven’t read the original being spoofed, so I missed a lot of jokes

To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis

by Leave a Comment

This was a good book that I would have liked an abridged copy of. I read Doomsday Book last year for #CannonBookClub, but this was a slightly different flavor, although set in the same universe of Oxford using time travel for history-studying purposes. Through a series of convolutions, Ned ends up in the Victorian era (not his specialty) trying to help fix a timeline incongruity. He’s working with a classmate, Verity Kindle (excellent name), who has already been back and forth to the era multiple times. He also gets involved with a love-addled doofus and a professor so absent-minded it […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Purchase To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis or any item from amazon via our link.

Funds raised are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name.

Share the post "Haven’t read the original being spoofed, so I missed a lot of jokes"

3/27/2017 | 's CBR9 Review No:9 |

Beware an adolescent dragon with Thoughts about Injustice

Throne of Jade by Naomi Novik

by 1 Comment

Anything is better with added dragons, right? This series adds dragons to historical fiction, and it works wonderfully. Napoleon has French dragons! England has British dragons! There are dragon battles by sea and by air. It’s all pretty tremendous, and it’s anchored by dragon Temeraire and his British captain Laurence. Laurence was in the Navy, but when his ship captured a French vessel and took its dragon egg as spoils of war, he ended up with an unexpected hatchling that bonded/imprinted on him, and now the two are an unstoppable team. Their backstory was told in the first book. This […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Purchase Throne of Jade by Naomi Novik or any item from amazon via our link.

Funds raised are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name.

Share the post "Beware an adolescent dragon with Thoughts about Injustice"

3/22/2017 | 's CBR9 Review No:8 |

Just go watch some DVD commentaries

Joss Whedon: The Biography by Amy Pascale

by 1 Comment

I’m not sure who this book is for. As a die-hard Whedonite, I already knew most of it. For someone who wasn’t already a fan, why would they care? Plus, the author goes into a weird amount of detail about eeeeeeverything. I can understand a quick recap of what Buffy is about, maybe for those who only discovered Joss through Avengers. And I can understand slightly a recap of the Alien universe (Joss did most of the screenplay for Alien: Resurrection) for people who aren’t fans of scary sci-fi. But who hasn’t seen Toy Story? Is there anyone left on […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Purchase Joss Whedon: The Biography by Amy Pascale or any item from amazon via our link.

Funds raised are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name.

Share the post "Just go watch some DVD commentaries"

3/2/2017 | 's CBR9 Review No:7 |

Revisiting a foggily-remembered classic

The Hero and the Crown, the Blue Sword by Robin McKinley

by 4 Comments

Does it count as a reread if you don’t remember anything about the books? These have been on my shelf for years, but I remembered nothing but dragons. Aerin is a princess, but not the Disney variety. Her mother was a commoner and a witch, and the people of her father’s kingdom don’t like her much. She keeps to herself, feeling alone and useless, until one day she decides to take fate into her own hands and rides off to become a dragon hunter. She trains a trusty steed and earns a magical sword, then goes out to defeat evil, […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Purchase The Hero and the Crown, the Blue Sword by Robin McKinley or any item from amazon via our link.

Funds raised are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name.

Share the post "Revisiting a foggily-remembered classic"

2/14/2017 | 's CBR9 Review No:6 |

“Just once, Ofelia would have liked people to see her as she was, not as their ideas painted her.”

Remnant Population by Elizabeth Moon

by 3 Comments

Ofelia is a woman in her 70s, living with her tiresome son and his tiresome wife on a planet chosen for colonization by a soulless company. When the company decides the colony isn’t thriving (after 40 years), they decide to pull the plug, put everybody into cryo, and send them to another planet to try again. After 70 years of dancing to other people’s tunes, Ofelia decides enough is enough, and all she wants to do is work in her garden and be in charge of her own self. So she hides when the evacuation shuttles come, and then has […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Purchase Remnant Population by Elizabeth Moon or any item from amazon via our link.

Funds raised are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name.

Share the post "“Just once, Ofelia would have liked people to see her as she was, not as their ideas painted her.”"

1/31/2017 | 's CBR9 Review No:4 |

Follow CBR on Instagram

Shop on Amazon and Support CBR

Buy Original Cannonballer Prisco's book and help CBR!

Ad Partner