Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“They were supposed to grow up with their hands in each other’s pockets, compensating for one another’s weaknesses, encouraging one another’s strengths.”

Middlegame (Alchemical Journeys, #1) by Seanan McGuire

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This was my first Seanan McGuire book, which is a little unbelievable, both because she writes in genres I love, and because she writes so very prolifically. And I started with a really good one. I’m not against spoilers and frequently spoil myself for things, but I went into this book almost completely unspoiled, even for the premise, and I think that’s the way to go. The book is so weird it’s almost impossible to really sum up in a blurb anyway. So, how to […]

Romantically imaginative

This is a Poem That Heals Fish by Jean-Pierre Simeon

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A perk of my job is to see the books ordered by customers as I process them. I had seen the title This is a Poem That Heals Fish on the list to be ordered and was thinking it was going to be odd.  And when it came in, I gave it a small peek. Yes, it is odd. But Jean-Pierre Simeon’s work is more than just odd. It is a poem within a poem within a poem (I think I captured all the layers). […]

The Elenium & Tamuli: More fantasy tropes than you can imagine

The Diamond Throne by David Eddings

The Ruby Knight by David Eddings

The Sapphire Rose by David Eddings

Domes of Fire by David Eddings

The Shining Ones by David Eddings

The Hidden City by David Eddings

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After the success of the Belgariad and Malloreon the author David Eddings followed it up with another twin series – this time the trilogies known as the Elenium and the Tamuli. These series focused initially on a quasi-medieval European society complete with monarchies, internal squabbles between nobility, knights in armour, and a dominant Catholic style church. Later, we travel further afield into an East Asian analogue as well. Layered over this is the concept of gods being very real and capable of giving the gift […]

Thought provoking stories

How High We Go In The Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu

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This was a really interesting novel told through stories – not nearly as madcap as A Visit From the Goon Squad but a similar idea / form. The establishing story reveals the origin of what will be a super bug, a pandemic with horrific consequences. Each subsequent story picks up on a related aspect of the ensuing hundreds (or, in some cases, thousands) of years during and post pandemic. Each story explores something a little different – grief writ large, as the world experiences during a […]

If you hit me with your cane again, you’re gone

a good myth is hard to kill by MajorGodComplex

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Kaz is a smart man, but not smart enough to reconsider snarking the most powerful man in the world when dragged out of Ketterdam and across the fold to work for him. Kaz isn’t worried. He’s got plot armor. The Darkling showed his hand much too early with all of that ‘together we’ll change the world’ bullshit.  Still, when the shadows begin to close in on him he can’t help but consider the possibility he may have miscalculated. ……………. Thanks to his black kefta, that’s […]

Gift and Read

Unicorn Christmas by Diana Murray

We’re Off to Find a Fairy by Corey Reid

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Christmas is around the corner, and some people like to give books for the day.  I have two books that might work as gifts. Now it might not get to you before Christmas if your store does not have it in stock, but you can put it on your list for next year. What am I talking about? Unicorn Christmas by Diana Murray, that’s what! Okay, so I was not completely thrilled with the text (it was a tad younger than I usually like) but […]



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