Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


No one to blame but myself

Booty Hunter by KC Cross (aka JA Huss)

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Booty Hunter’s ridiculous alien physiologies come wrapped in a surprisingly decent plot with some unexpectedly beautiful moments of found family, a space battle that actually kind of works, and a soulmate coupling that would be, by turns, both very hot and very sweet—with shockingly healthy relationship psychology to boot—if it weren’t for the part where the hero’s occupation is kidnapping women to be forced into sex work in the high-end prostitution outfit he and his brothers run. The name of the book is “Booty Hunter.” […]

A Sweet Take on Witches

The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna

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I listened to this book by Sangu Mandanna as an audiobook, read by Samara MacLaren.  It was a sweet, easy read that made my commute fly by.  In The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches, it is set out early on (so not a spoiler) that all witches are orphans due to a bungled curse centuries ago.  Whenever a witch is born, she is almost immediately orphaned leaving her to be raised by others.  Our protagonist is Mika, born and orphaned in India then brought […]

Miscellaneous Shifter Ridiculousness (TM)

Claimed by Laurann Dohner and Kele Moon

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Warning: Contains one character accidentally “mating” (bonding someone to him for life) another character without their consent. Also contains kidnapping, threat of sexual assault, talk of eating humans in a non-sexytimes way, biting and consumption of blood in a sexytimes way, and Miscellaneous Shifter RidiculousnessTM. Claimed (2016) by Laurann Dohner and Kele Moon Nightwind Pack series 3.5 stars I first listened to Laurann Dohner and Kele Moon’s Claimed in 2021 and have re-listened more than once since then. Given the warnings above, I worry a […]

Everything’s more fun with kids…maybe

Nasty, Brutish, and Short: Adventures in Philosophy With My Kids by Scott Hershovitz

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I have often found philosophy frustrating at best. I’m a pretty concrete thinker, so when questions get too vague or nonsensical to me, I shake my head in annoyance and check out. But when I saw Nasty, Brutish, and Short: Adventures in Philosophy With My Kids (2022) on NPR’s latest list, I figured this might be the kind of philosophy book I can tolerate. And, on the whole, I think I did tolerate this one. In fact, I was even occasionally inspired to see how we can use philosophy […]

What Does the Memoir Writer Owe Those In Their Story?

Out of the Corner by Jennifer Grey

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Best for: Fans of the actress. In a nutshell: Actress Jennifer Grey – best known for her role as Baby in Dirty Dancing – shares stories from her life, from childhood until now. Worth quoting: N/A Why I chose it: Someone was raving about it. How it left me feeling: Ambivalent. Review: How does one handle having a major success in their field and then ultimately not being able to reproduce it? What is it like when people who don’t know you are commenting on […]

It’s hard trying to look at something unfiltered by the vast acclaim of its author

The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin

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I think I’m a well-intentioned person. But we all do, I suppose. I try to read more books written by women. But I often don’t. Since I started reviewing books for CBR, I’ve reviewed 91 stories written by women, which is a hair over 20% of everything I’ve read. CBR07: 2 (7%) CBR08: 32 (29%) CBR09: 20 (26%) CBR10: 6 (11%) CBR11: 5 (18%) CBR12: 16 (26%) CBR13: 9 (18%) CBR14: 1 (8%) That’s abysmal. There’s no two ways about it. And that’s after some […]



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