Cannonball Read 10

Sticking it to Cancer One Book at a Time

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Fiat.Luxury

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Fiat.Luxury's Reviews:

This book is a delight.

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

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I picked this up because it was on everyone’s to-read lists.  I thought it was probably about Cold War spies, maybe something along the lines of John le Carré. This is not a book about Cold War spies. This is the story of Count Alexander Ilyich Rostov, who has been sentenced to house arrest in the Hotel Metropole, where he is in fact already a resident, for writing a poem. (It could have been worse–it could have been a bullet to the head.) Rostov is a man of manners and charm–old school, if you will–and determines that if the world […]

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8/22/2017 's CBR9 Review No:9 |

If you’re looking for a memoir, this is a good one.

Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah

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I don’t really do memoirs so much but had heard so many good things about this book that I was convinced to try it.  All the good reviews are right, and this book is great. I hadn’t heard of Trevor Noah before he took over The Daily Show, and while I still miss Jon Stewart (I mean, who doesn’t?) Noah has grown on me.  After this book, I like him even more.  This is not a comedian’s memoir; rather, it’s a growing-up memoir, stories about a boy trying to make his way in a confused and confusing world, and it […]

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8/18/2017 's CBR9 Review No:8 |

Know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em.

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

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This is a book about luck and love and sex and  history and hate and imperialism, and, most of all, about playing the hand you’ve been dealt. Pachinko is a great big family saga. The main character, if there is one, is introduced fairly early on: Sunja, a teenager living with her mother who runs a boarding house in a fishing village in (what is now South) Korea, during Japanese occupation. A suave older man seduces her, one thing leads to the next, (this actually was my favorite part of the book, so I don’t want to spoil it!) and […]

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8/3/2017 's CBR9 Review No:7 |

Loneliness and magic in the Alaskan wilderness.

The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey

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I love modern takes on fairy tales, so this seemed like a good bet. We’re in the Alaskan frontier in the 1920s.  Homesteaders from Pennsylvania Mable and Jack have set out for a new life together–they can’t have children, and they need a new scene. Their second winter in Alaska is harsh, cold, and miserable, but during one evening of lightheartedness, they build a little girl out of snow. The next morning, there’s no snow child left, but they do see a little girl wearing the same scarf and mittens.  Over the years, Mable and Jack “adopt” her as their child, and there is always […]

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5/4/2017 's CBR9 Review No:6 |

Read this book! And then give it to someone else to read.

Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi

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Here’s another one going on my “give to all my friends” list! This book is really, really good. Each chapter is a vignette of one person per generation, starting with two half-sisters, Essie and Effia.  One is sold into slavery, the other married to a British slaver.  The chapters follow six of each of their descendants in Ghana and America.  As you might expect, 6 generations of African and Africa-American history includes some seriously ugly chapters: colonialism, explicit and implicit racism, the transatlantic slave trade, the Fugitive Slave Act, sharecropping, and on and on. The most beautiful part of this book is how wonderfully the […]

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

I brought a lot of feelings to this review.

The Mothers by Brit Bennet

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I had high hopes for this book.  Seems like everyone I know was going on about how heartfelt and heartbreaking it was.  But it did not break my heart, and that was disappointing.  Let’s discuss. Summary: Nadia Turner, seventeen, recently lost her mother to suicide (not a spoiler!  you learn this on like page 2). She is beautiful, smart, going to Michigan on a scholarship.  After her mother’s death, she’s grieving, hanging out with her new church-going bff with Aubrey, looking forward to getting out of Dodge for college…and covertly dating the pastor’s boy Luke.  And you know what they say about preacher’s […]

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5/2/2017 's CBR9 Review No:4 |

This book is now at the top of my “books to give to friends” list

The Unseen World by Liz Moore

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Narfna told me to read this, so I did, and you should too.  I blame the toddler for the fact that it took me three days to finish, because what I wanted to do was sit down and read straight through. I hesitate to give away too much of the plot because it was a joy to go in knowing nothing.  So how about just a tiny summary?  Ada adores her father David, a single father who directs a computer science lab in 1980s-era Boston.  When he begins to fade, she is compelled to a lifelong journey of discovery—about her […]

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3/23/2017 's CBR9 Review No:3 |

Bringing a whole new meaning to the phrase “veg out.”

The Vegetarian by Han Kang

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This is a sticky book.  It’s kind of stuck in my imagination.  I keep turning it over in my head, feeling a little closer to picking up what Kang was putting down.  It’s clever but unassuming, sharp, subtle, violent and serene.  I don’t really know what to do with it, and that makes me like it more.  (I’ll include a few tiny spoilers in this review, but it might be best to go in cold.) Set in South Korea (this is a translation of what was in the original Korean three novellas) Yeong-hye is an ordinary woman with an ordinary husband […]

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

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1/17/2017 's CBR9 Review No:2 |


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