Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


About Ellesfena

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I mostly read nonfiction (especially public health-related), mysteries, and fantasy. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: Ellesfena's Quick Questions interview.)

Ellesfena's Reviews:

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Cue the Sun!: The Invention of Reality TV by Emily Nussbaum

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The book: Cue the Sun! is a definitive history of reality television, beginning with “man on the street” radio shows and ending with The Apprentice in the early aughts. Most chapters are devoted to a single show or creator who was revolutionary within the genre, like Cops, Survivor, The Real World, or Chuck Barris’s 70’s game shows. In addition to high level overviews of the development and reception of these shows and trends within reality TV, Emily Nussbaum also interviewed cast and crew members from countless reality productions. Why I read […]

My Year of Dark Academia is Off to an Uneven Start

If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio

A Study in Drowning by Ava Reid

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Lately I’ve been finding myself drawn to dark academia, so I thought this year I might embrace it and go whole hog. I started the year off with two very different dark academia novels–one that I mostly enjoyed, and one that I didn’t really enjoy at all. First up, I read A Study in Drowning by Ava Reid. Effy is an architecture student at a prestigious college, but she wants to be a literature student–only women aren’t allowed to study literature. Her favorite author is Emrys Myrddin, […]

With Great Power Comes Great Hubris

Song of Spider-Man by Glen Berger

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Song of Spider-Man is the story behind the conception, development, and production of one of Broadway’s most famous and most troubled musicals: Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. Glen Berger, who co-wrote the book for the production, wrote this behind-the-scenes story while the musical was still running–but by the time the paperback came out, it had shut down after numerous performers had been injured and millions of dollars had been lost. I don’t really remember where I first heard of this book, but it’s been on my TBR for […]

Judging some books by their covers

Shady Hollow by Juneau Black

Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands by Heather Fawcett

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A few months ago on vacation, my niece and I stopped in a bookstore to browse. We saw the Shady Hollow series display at the same time and both said, “Ooooh.” These books have the most charming covers, so I downloaded the first one from my library to read on the flight home. Naturally, my hope was that the story would be just as charming so I could justify buying them all to hoard like a dragon. Sadly, ’twas not to be. Shady Hollow, a cozy mystery […]

This is a book that I read.

Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

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I remember watching Lonesome Dove with my grandparents as a child, although I remember absolutely nothing about the plot (I was probably not actually watching, but reading something while it was on in the background). What I remember most is how much my grandparents liked it. A couple years ago I decided maybe I’d try to read the book. I stopped and started at least 3 times, struggling to have any interest in the lives of a couple retired Texas Rangers. It wasn’t until this year, when […]



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