Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

About ElCicco

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Married, mom of two, history PhD, feminist. I've been participating in Cannonball Read since CBR4. I love to read, and writing reviews keeps me from reading without thinking. I feel like I owe it to the authors who entertain me to savor their creations. It's like slowing down and enjoying a delicious meal instead of bolting your food. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: ElCicco's Quick Questions interview.)

ElCicco's Reviews:

An entertaining read for Women’s History month

The Alewives: A Plague-Era Tale of Murder, Friendship and Fine Ale by Elizabeth R. Andersen

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Another shout out to Narfna for putting this on my radar. I am your literary stalker! This was a very entertaining murder mystery set in an era that has always fascinated me and featuring a set of unusual sleuths. I’d never read any of Elizabeth Andersen’s books before, but I gather that historical fiction is her thing and setting a murder in the immediate aftermath of the Black Death had me from the get go. Even better, the sleuths in this novel, which I hope […]

Golden Girls with Guns

Killers of a Certain Age: A Novel by Deanna Raybourn

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Back in 2010 a Bruce Willis movie called Red (Retired, Extremely Dangerous) came out. I don’t especially love action movies but this one was great — a comedy action movie with a load of outstanding actors in it, including John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman, and Helen Mirren. They all play retired secret agents whom Willis convinces to come out of retirement when he finds himself targeted by mysterious forces. Helen Mirren was my favorite as a bad ass weapons expert who has been running a genteel […]

Crime, suspense and romance in Regency England

The Benevolent Society of Ill-Mannered Ladies (The Ill-Mannered Ladies Book 1) by Alison Goodman

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Shoutout to Narfna for bringing this book to my attention! This was a very entertaining novel that contains three exciting adventures featuring a highly unusual woman in Regency England. Lady Augusta Colebrook is forty-something, single, and a member of the noble class. She and her fraternal twin sister Lady Julia are well connected and well liked in London society, but then again very few people know about their private activities. When we meet Augusta (Gus) and Julia, they are attempting to help a married friend […]

The big reread that I should have done before my last review

All Systems Red by Martha Wells

Artificial Condition by Martha Wells

Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells

Exit Strategy by Martha Wells

Network Effect by Martha Wells

Fugitive Telemetry by Martha Wells

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After reading the latest novel in Martha Wells’ Murderbot Diaries, I decided I wanted to reread the whole series, which I originally reviewed for CBR14. I had thought of doing this before reviewing System Collapse, but I told myself it wasn’t necessary and I should focus on all the books on my TBR list. But I love this series so much and going back through the whole run was fun. I expect this is the kind of thing I will do with every new Murderbot release. […]

Free Will

System Collapse: The Murderbot Diaries Book 7 by Martha Wells

by 1 Comment

I read all the previous Murderbot stories at the beginning of CBR14 (reviews here, here and here), and while the details of those novels were perhaps a little fuzzy for me when I started this latest Murderbot, I was quickly up to speed and enjoying the continuing saga of everyone’s favorite misanthropic human-robot hybrid. As usual I zipped through this and loved it for its snarky humor and for its development of Murderbot’s relationships with the humans it works for and the artificial intelligence it […]

My first DNF

Poor Things by Alasdair Gray

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I wanted to love this book. On the face of it, it ticks off a lot of boxes that appeal to me. It could be that my mind is unfocused right now because a lot is going on at home, but I really think there is a problem with this book. I’d never heard of it before the movie came out and maybe I know why. It’s tedious and pedantic. Poor Things is a kind of Mary Shelley Frankenstein story where the “monster” is a […]



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