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:

No one knows what goes on behind closed doors

Men Like Ours: A Novel by Bindu Bansinath

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Cbr18bingo Wealth The story opens with Matthew, a wealthy man, found dead in his car I picked up Men Like Ours at our local library, drawn in by its cover which reminded me of Parini Shroff’s The Bandit Queens. It turns out the two novels are a bit alike. Each features Indian women living in a small-ish communities with similar complaints: financial woes, bad marriages, worries about children, and thwarted dreams. Men Like Ours, however, is set in New Jersey amongst the women of Willow […]

Don’t let the cute little kid fool you. This is a bloody tale of vengeance.

Lone Wolf & Cub Deluxe Edition Volume 1 by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima

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Cbr18bingo Right – It’s manga, so you read it right to left I heard about Lone Wolf & Cub a few years ago but had been unable to find a copy of it until recently. Last year, Dark Horse published a deluxe edition of this manga classic, which was first published in Japan starting in 1970. Kazuo Koike’s original story has been translated by Dana Lewis. In addition to Goseki Kojima’s masterful and dynamic ink drawings, this deluxe edition includes a few of his color […]

A novel of rebellions, large and small

The House of Doors: A Novel by Tan Twan Eng

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Cbr18bingo Justice: a murder trial is a key part of the story The House of Doors is a work of fiction that includes real people and a real murder trial that occurred in Kuala Lumpur in 1911. The murder trial of Edith Proudlock became the subject of a W. Somerset Maugham story, The Letter, which later became a play and film. In this novel, author Tan Twan Eng imagines how Maugham came to write that story. Set in Penang, Malaysia, it is a story of […]

“The wonder is that you could start life with nothing, end with nothing, and lose so much in between.”

Demon Copperhead: A Novel by Barbara Kingsolver

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Cbr18bingo Repair: novel deals with drug addiction and rehab, broken individuals and a broken community I had a hard time choosing which bingo square to use for this one, so many could apply. Left — because so many characters and their community have been left behind. Refuge — characters take refuge in drug use to deal with physical and other pains. Or —main character ultimately has to make a major either/or decision about his life. Demon Copperhead is Barbara Kingsolver’s Pulitzer Prize winning re-imagination of Dickens’ […]

I was a little lost but it was a fun ride all the same

Adversary to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer

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Cbr18bingo And (4th book in the Villain series) Bingo #1 Adversary to the Villain is the fourth book in Hannah Nicole Maehrer’s Villain series, with a fifth and final volume to follow next year. I read the first three volumes last summer and liked them very much. I had intended to do a re-read before jumping into book 4 but I never got around to it and I have some regrets about that. Perhaps if I had reread at least volume three I would have […]

Love in the time of COVID

Romantic Comedy: A Novel by Curtis Sittenfeld

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Cbr18bingo Joker Sally Milz is a writer for The Night Owls, aka TNO, a late night sketch comedy show à la SNL. She is divorced, in her 30s, and has been writing for the show for several years, a dream come true for her. When internationally renowned singer/songwriter Noah Brewster hosts the show, some of Sally’s deeply held opinions about fame, dating and romance — informed by her own not so great experiences — are called into question. For Sally, this is a deeply unsettling […]



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