Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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I'm left-handed! (Learn more about this Cannonballer: Halbs's Quick Questions interview.)

Halbs's Reviews:

“stand back astonished / stand back and observe”

Twenty Poems to Nourish Your Soul by Judith Valente, Charles Reynard

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This poem is endless, the odds against us are endless, our chances of being alive together statistically nonexistent; still we have made it – from Lisel Mueller’s “Alive Together” April is National Poetry Month, so I wanted to squeeze in this review this week. However, I didn’t squeeze in this book. No, I read it over months (years?), coming back and forth to certain poems, picking them up and putting them down to see how they look on different days, in different light. What I […]

“If it works, it works!”

How to Defeat a Demon King in Ten Easy Steps by Andrew Rowe

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While I have been a tabletop role playing game guy for about a decade, I was unaware of the literary role playing game (LitRPG) subgenre until earlier this year, when I found out friend’s son was publishing LitRPG books under a pen name (Exciting!) LitRPG is, I guess, kind of a narrative fiction in which characters level up like they would in an RPG. At first blush I was a little confused by this, because it seems like RPGs are often based on fantasy or […]

I’m a seriffs guy, personally.

Love Lettering by Kate Clayborn

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Love Lettering is a portable romantic comedy – it would make a great movie, limited series, comic book, etc. Good job, Kate Clayborn! Love Lettering is about Meg – an up-and-coming hand-letterer and designer in Brooklyn. A few years ago she moved from the Midwest to New York with her best friend, Sibyl. Sibyl, aka Sibi, is an actress looking to make her way in the City. Meg is more of a wanderer than a planner (even though she custom designs planners), but seems to […]

Book Indifferencers

Book Lovers by Emily Henry

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I’ve previously read/loved Emily Henry’s other books, Beach Reads & People We Meet on Vacation. As you’ll see in that previous review, I love Henry’s writing. And I can’t wait for the movie(s)  of her books to come out! So, believe me when I say that I’m sad that I can’t give this book more stars. Emily Henry is great (and also a fun Instagram follow, by the way). But this one didn’t work for me. Why? I don’t think the romantic co-lead is as […]

“In mind, God; In the hand, work.”

The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali by Sri Swami Satchidananda

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This book is on the suggested reading list of Yoga With Adriene’s Adriene Mischler. It’s the fourth book on the list that I’ve read. While this book is called The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, it does not include all of Patanjali’s yoga sutras. Instead, it contains select sutras, as well as commentary on most of the select sutras. Sri Swami Satchidananda provides the translation and commentary. Sutra literally means “thread”, but here its used more to mean yoga aphorisms.  And yoga here is not hatha […]

We can’t go faster than light but maybe spacetime can!?

The Science of Sci-Fi: From Warp Speed to Interstellar Travel by Erin Macdonald

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This year is my “No-Buy Year,” so I’m trying (and mostly succeeding!) to cut way back on buying books in any form. I already have so many that I haven’t read! So right now I’m going through a backlog of Audible books on my now-defunct account. (I switched to Libro.fm last year to support local indie bookstores with my audiobook purchases. Highly recommend!) A benefit of the No-Buy Year is rediscovering the myriad things you previously thought highly enough of to purchase, but then shortly […]



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