Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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About drmllz

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I'm a literature and media studies lecturer and researcher at a university on the south coast of England (my reviews are absolutely not meant to be taken in my professional capacity nor reflect the views of my institution). I've participated in some early CBRs and then came back for CBR 14 onwards. Much like every year, I'd like to do more reading for fun, especially of contemporary fiction, and less crashing in front of Netflix. In 2021 I had a cancer diagnosis and surgery--it really helped following along with CBR reads and Facebook chat and knowing there were people out there enjoying reading books and supporting cancer research and patients even amid all the pandemic chaos. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: drmllz's Quick Questions interview.)

drmllz's Reviews:

“From sprinkler splashes to fireplace ashes / I waited ages to see you there”

Cassandra at the Wedding (1962) by Dorothy Baker

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I was going to make a few brief notes about this and then add this to my review roundup of the Monica Heisey and Curtis Sittenfeld books–and they sort of make a good triptych of more or less complicated women by women writers. But I ended up rambling a bit more about this one, and indeed, Cassandra of Cassandra at the Wedding is not so much complicated, or even messy, but a full on crucible of chaos and doubt and solipsism in human form, who […]

“And isn’t it just so pretty to think / All along there was some invisible string / Tying you to me?”

Really Good, Actually (2023) by Monica Heisey

Romantic Comedy (2023) by Curtis Sittenfeld

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Really Good, Actually (2023) by Monica Heisey I came across Monica Heisey on Caroline O’Donoghue’s podcast Sentimental Garbage, in an episode on ‘Break-Ups’, and then found out that Heisey had been a writer on Schitt’s Creek, which I love enough that I wrote an academic chapter on it and still managed to love it afterwards. Really Good, Actually, does not at all have a Schitt’s Creek vibe, which is good! We love a versatile creative type! It’s about Maggie and her post-divorce malaise at the […]

cloisterf*ck

The Cloisters (2022) by Katy Hays

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I am posting a picture from Christchurch Priory, Dorset, a medieval structure which actually would be a good place for a murder mystery. I’m not going to post a picture of the book cover, because the cover is beautiful and it will suck you in to buying it and you will end up throwing it across the room and denting it anyway. At least if you’re an academic. The setting is the Cloisters section of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the narrator/protagonist is Ann, a […]

“change the dedication / from revolution to revelation”

Special Topics in Calamity Physics (2006) by Marisha Pessl

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At some point as a student I came across French theorist Roland Barthes’s ‘The Death of the Author’ (1967), which suggests (in translation) that a text ought to be read as a “tissue of quotations” (instead of a single isolated product of a clearly identifiable authorial intention; I paraphrase and summarise wildly here). I vaguely thought of “tissue” initially as the kind of tissue you’d sneeze into, woven to be flimsy and fragile and disposable. Later, I thought of “tissue” as in the weavings of […]

“Everybody knows that you’ve been faithful / give or take a night or two”

The End of the Affair (1951) by Graham Greene

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The End of the Affair exhumes a febrile wartime love affair between Maurice Bendrix, author, and Sarah Miles, wife of civil servant in the Home Security ministry Henry Miles. The affair is revisited retrospectively from Bendrix’s perspective, filtered through his authorly lens, hazy with self-righteousness, foggy with jealousy and thwarted passion–and then we get to visit it in real time via Sarah’s diary, which slices through Bendrix’s craft and self-centredness and desire and pretension with a steel blade forged in the fires of the Blitz […]

“For whom the wedding bells toll”

Sofia Khan is Not Obliged (2015) by Ayisha Malik

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I wrote a review of Dorothy B. Hughes’s bleak noir novel Ride the Pink Horse (1946) as part of my Bingo this year, and said something about how it implodes comforting myths, and Emmalita commented, which was lovely, about how she came back to romance because sometimes people need escape from noir and need comforting myths (I paraphrase). I chewed this over in my head for a few weeks, and ended up digging out an unread romance novel I bought a while back, Sofia Khan […]



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