Cannonball Read 11

Sticking it to Cancer One Book at a Time

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xoxoxoe

I am an artist, blogger, and culture critic. I write about movies, books, television, pop culture—old and new—with a feminine/feminist perspective. sometimes I post pictures of the kid, too. Check out my blog, xoxoxo e, for all of my recent interests, exploits, and opinionated opinions.

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xoxoxoe's Reviews:

Books to Film: Pal Joey and BUtterfield 8

John O'Hara: Four Novels of the 1930s by John O'Hara

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After recently reading Truman Capote’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s, I decided that I not only wanted to continue with my book-to-film theme, but keep it centered in New York City, too. That led me to John O’Hara’s  Pal Joey and BUtterfield 8. I had heard for years that the 1957 film version of Pal Joey was nothing like the 1940 Rodgers and Hart Broadway musical – Gene Kelly apparently portrayed him as a genuine no-good crumb (as Joey would say). In the film Frank Sinatra isn’t exactly an angel, but he has enough of the proverbial heart of gold to win the […]

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Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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9/24/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No: 7 |

Free Spirit Holly Golightly, Forever a Cipher

Breakfast at Tiffany's by Truman Capote

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Breakfast at Tiffany’s the book shares a lot of the same traits as Breakfast at Tiffany’s the film: charming in places, predictable in others, with some questionable and unnecessary ethnic and racist slurs. Truman Capote wrote it in 1958, but the story is set in 1943 as a young, unnamed writer (Capote’s stand-in) moves into a brownstone on the upper east side of Manhattan. He soon encounters his 19 year-old enigmatic neighbor, Holly Golightly. She proceeds to charm and repel him at intervals, while remaining oblivious to his roller coaster-like reactions to her. Holly is definitely the most interesting character […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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9/23/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No: 6 |

I Loved Laura, Except for . . .

Laura by Vera Caspary

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Another book from my personal challenge of reading the source material for favorite classic movies: Laura, by Vera Caspary. This book is a detective noir, as hard-boiled and cynical as any of the genre, but written by a woman. It was originally published, a la Dickens, as a serial, “Ring Twice for Laura,” in Colliers Magazine in 1942/43. The  classic film noir, starring Gene Tierney as Laura and Dana Andrews as a detective who finds himself falling in love with a dead woman as he investigates her murder, came out a year later – so Hollywood was right on this […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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9/23/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No: 5 |

The Uninvited: Ghosts Like Us

The Uninvited by Dorothy Macardle

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I love old black and white movies, especially mysteries and horror movies. I was watching one of my all-time favorites, The Uninvited, a ghost story starring Ray Milland recently (it’s a really superior film – I highly recommend it if you’ve never seen it) and I started to wonder where the idea for the movie had come from. Was it an original screenplay? A short story? A novel? A quick internet search revealed that the film, directed by English director Lewis Allen was based on a 1941 novel written by Irish author Dorothy Macardle. If I had these idle thoughts […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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9/22/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No: 4 |

Miss Marple Solves It Again (and Again and Again)

Miss Marple: The Complete Short Stories by Agatha Christie

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Keeping up my summer tradition of an Agatha Christie re-read I picked up Miss Marple: the Complete Short Stories. Hercule Poirot has always been my favorite Christie sleuth – it must be the Virgo in me that loves his precise mode of detection. I like a few of the Miss Marple novels, but wasn’t as familiar with the short stories. What’s great about Christie is that her books, no matter how intricately plotted, are (like Stephen King’s) character-driven. So, even if you have read them before and vaguely remember whodunnit, there is pleasure in the re-read, as the people are still […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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9/22/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No: 3 |

Not Enough Egypt for Me in This Preposterous Thriller

The Pharaoh Key by Preston & Child

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Whenever I feel the need for some literary comfort food my first instinct is to grab a mystery or crime thriller. I think it’s the combination of thrills with puzzle-solving that appeals to me. The title of this paperback. The Pharaoh Key, jumped out at me because it not only promised a mystery, but it combined another one of my interests, ancient Egypt. I have read some other books by this author team, Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child, featuring their investigator Agent Prendergast, so I thought I’d give this a try. It is apparently part of a series featuring Indiana […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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9/22/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No: 2 |

Fire & Blood: Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah…

Fire & Blood by George R.R. Martin

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I loved Game of Thrones from its very first episode. I was as shocked as any non-reader of the series at its Psycho-like twist in its penultimate first season episode. As soon as I could I grabbed a copy of the first novel. I read the rest and watched the series rush to its inevitable conclusion. I wasn’t as put off as some folks by plot turns that I felt I had seen coming, or at least had been hinted at as very possible outcomes. During the course of the show I probably even thought that some background of the […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

Share the post "Fire & Blood: Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah, Blah…"

9/22/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No: 1 |

Madness, Illness, Grief, and The Haunting of Hill House

The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

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Beware of mild spoilers … I recently finished watching The Haunting of Hill House on Netflix. But it is still with me. It was at times an uncomfortable watch, but it also may be one of the best things I’ve seen in a long time. It can’t really be called an adaptation of the immortal Shirley Jackson novel. That classic book could be considered more of a jumping-off point for this, an original, deeply-felt horror story. The original novel, first published in 1959, concerns a group of disparate people who have come together to study a house with a bad, […]

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11/14/2018 | Post by


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