Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


About Sophia

CBR 3
CBR 4
CBR 5
CBR 6
CBR 7
CBR 8
CBR 9
CBR10 participant
CBR11 participant
CBR12 participant
CBR13 participant
CBR14 Participant
CBR15 Participant
CBR16 Participant
CBR17 Participant
CBR18 Participant
CBR18 Levels

I love to read, and I love to learn. I wish I were retired so I could spend more time on my random flights of fancy. (Learn more about this Cannonballer: Sophia's Quick Questions interview.)

Sophia's Reviews:

Drugs don’t always help

Unshrunk by Laura Delano

by Leave a Comment

Unshrunk: A Story of Psychiatric Treatment Resistance (2025) by Laura Delano is another book I discovered on NPR’s List of Favorite Books. I have an older brother who fell into some major mental health problems when he was in college. He has had a very hard life since then. He is often difficult, nonsensical and hard to be around, but I also know what he was like before he got sick. In an effort to understand him better or maybe find something to help him, I find […]

A family too annoying to care about

These Summer Storms by Sarah MacLean

by 1 Comment

I saw These Summer Storms (2025) by Sarah MacLean on NPR’s Favorite Books List. I’ve never read anything by Sarah MacLean, but I’m a fan of romance novels, and this one seemed interesting enough. So I picked it up. Unfortunately, I found this one more disappointing than not. After a fun beginning, the plot did not feel believable, and I didn’t like the characters. By the end of the book, I was curious how it was going to end, but I was also ready for it to be […]

This is what happens when we break book club rules

West With Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge

by Leave a Comment

I read West With Giraffes (2021) by Lynda Rutledge because it was chosen by my book club. After reading some pretty bad books, we’ve made up a loose rule that you need to have read the book before nominating it for book club. Well, it didn’t happen this time. The husband of one of our book clubbers said it would be a good book for us. I think the majority of us would agree that it was not. I think I was most frustrated at what it […]

Surprisingly memorable and moving

Memorial Days by Geraldine Brooks

by Leave a Comment

I saw Memorial Days (2025) by Geraldine Brooks on a number of year-end lists. I wasn’t sure I wanted to read a book about grief, but there was something about the description that made me want to give it a try. This was my first book by Brooks, but I really enjoyed her writing. I thought she was honest, vulnerable, and insightful. On May 27, 2019, Brook’s husband and partner of over thirty years, Tony Horwitz, collapsed and died on a sidewalk in DC, where he was […]

What else can I learn about myself?

The Gifts of Imperfection by Brené Brown

by Leave a Comment

I’m a little burned out on self-help books, but I always think the next one will help me a little more. On the whole, I’ve learned some important things about myself, as well as various coping strategies. I keep reading them even though I’m tired of them because I have a little FOMO when it comes to missing that one book that will fully explain me to myself. Brené Brown was recommended to me by my therapist, and The Gifts of Imperfection (2010) seemed like something of […]

What will people think of us 100 years from now?

What We Can Know by Ian McEwan

by 1 Comment

I have read a number of books by Ian McEwan, including Atonement, Amsterdam, On Chesil Beach, Saturday, and The Children Act. Even though it’s been over ten years since I’ve read a McEwan book, I remember being impressed by his writing and enjoying his books. Thus, when I saw a number of lists touting What We Can Know (2025), I figured it was time to get back to him. What We Can Know takes place in post-apocalyptic Britain in 2119. Climate change and “The Derangement” have cut down the population by two […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo