Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


Join the CBR18 Book Bingo Reading Challenge—Now Underway!   

Give This The Miniseries Treatment!

A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark

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I was pretty excited to finally pick up and find the time to read A Master of Djinn. I had previously been delighted by P. Djèlí Clark’s alternative, magical steampunk 1910s Cairo. The setting is just so damned fun. The novellas I had read before Master of Djinn—The Haunting of Tram Car 015 and A Dead Djinn in Cairo— were masterful in how they managed to be so descriptive for short form works, so was I curious as to how he would adapt an entire novel into this […]

The Banned Books #CannonBookClub We’re With The Banned

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Cannon Book Club is live! Join in any or all of our three discussion posts: The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story by Nikole Hannah-Jones All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas   It is a little hard to believe, but we are a little over three weeks away from our Banned Books #CannonBookClub. (Where has this summer gone?) In honor of Banned Books Week’s 40th birthday we are reading All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson, The 1619 […]

“Intentions always look better on paper than in reality.”

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

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Another review of a Book Club choice, 2017’s The Hate U Give. A peek behind the scenes: this one almost got left off the voting, having been popular over the years but as it’s the 30th most challenged book of the decade 2010-2019 and the fifth most challenged in 2021 the argument to include it felt justified. This YA novel was challenged and banned in school libraries and curriculums because it was considered “pervasively vulgar” and because of drug use, profanity, and offensive language. Other […]

“What is a game? It’s tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. It’s a possibility of infinite rebirth.”

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

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Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin is a pure delight. The best book I have read all year, and now one of my favorites ever. Zevin is the author of one of my other favorite books of all time, The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry, I was so excited to hear about this book especially when I discovered it was about video game designers. The story starts when Sam and Sadie meet in a play area in a hospital. Sam is undergoing treatment […]

More Memoir-Manifestos, please!

All Boys Aren't Blue by George Matthew Johnson

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CBR Bingo – Bodies, because this book is all about how the author came to accept his identity – his life in his queer, Black body – it’s a letter of acceptance for everyone who might need it, which includes all of us. I loved this memoir – this vulnerable, beating heart of a book – which explores the life of a young, queer Black man growing up in New Jersey. Johnson describes how he came to accept himself even as he struggles with two […]

A rose in the concrete

The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas

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CBR Bingo – Snake, thanks to Officer Cruise and others like him that cannot understand their fear is not more important than the lives they take 16 year old Starr Carter is a master at code-switching. Growing up in Garden Heights, she is used to her community being full of lively characters full of love who look out for one another amidst gun shots and drug deals. When she is at home, she feels slightly isolated from this community, who sees her as an outsider […]



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