Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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About Pooja

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Ardent reader of pretty much anything, including the backs of shampoo bottles. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: Pooja's Quick Questions interview.)

Pooja's Reviews:

Matchmaker, Matchmaker, Make Me a Match

The Matchmaker by Aisha Saeed

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Nura is a third-generation matchmaker for high society, and business is thriving, even if she’s working herself ragged for it. But when a series of bizarre incidents starts plaguing her clients, Nura begins to realize that someone may have it out for her. Though arranged marriage is becoming less common among desi immigrants in the United States, there is definitely a thriving market for it. Nura’s methods are far more intensive than the folders with photos and personal and professional details that my dad sometimes […]

“We haunt them. They want to kill us but we will not die.”

Enter Ghost by Isabella Hammad

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After years away from Palestine, actress Sonia returns to visit her sister and takes a role in a West Bank performance of Hamlet, where she must grapple with her delicate relationship with her homeland. I’ve never read a book set in Palestine, which is why I requested this book on NetGalley. This book came out in 2023, but the intervening years have only made it more important to read. Hammad does an excellent job of capturing both Sonia’s alienation from and longing for Palestine and […]

The Latter Day Wild West

The Colony: Faith and Blood in a Promised Land by Sally Denton

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When a caravan of women and children were ambushed by masked gunmen on a remote Mexican road, it sent political ripples through both Mexico and the United States. But this is not the first time the LeBaron and La Mora communities have been in the headlines. Though this book uses the 2019 killings as the entry point into the story, it more broadly chronicles the history of this particular branch of the fundamentalist Mormon LeBaron family, which is well known for its polygamous practices and […]

A Jété into Love

Second Night Stand by Karelia Stetz-Waters, Fay Stetz-Waters

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When professional ballerina Lillian has a one night stand with a beautiful stranger in Portland, she does so only because she’s certain she’ll never see her again. But when it turns out that Izzy will be competing in the same dance competition show, their growing connection may get in the way of the win they both desperately need. I really loved Karelia Stetz-Waters’ previous book Behind the Scenes, so even though I haven’t been interested in reality show romances in the past I was excited […]

The Power of Audacity

The Improbable Victoria Woodhull by Eden Collinsworth

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Victoria Woodhull started life being paraded around as a child psychic by her conman father and marrying an alcoholic twice her age, but through a lot of work, luck, and audacity, she lived many lives as a stockbroker, a newspaper editor, a suffragette, the first female presidential candidate, and much more. Victoria Woodhull is one of those interesting American characters that’s been popping up in books I’ve read set in the Gilded Age for several years. She was eccentric and scrappy, but in many ways […]

Lost in the Brain Fog

The Sunset Years of Agnes Sharp by Leonie Swann

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When their neighbor turns up shot and killed, Agnes and her housemates are excited to be able to pin the death of their friend Lilith on the same murderer – if only they can solve the crime themselves before the police do. I picked up this book because the premise cracked me up. The image of these pensioners all creeping around trying to cover up one murder and solve another is just so dark and amusing. Of course, as I started reading I quickly found […]



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