Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Some Legends Don’t Withstand the Test of Time

Bram Stoker's Dracula by Bram Stoker, Edited by Jan Needle

by Leave a Comment

Full disclosure, I had no idea I’d ordered the edited and abridged version from the library, but I decided to give it a go anyway since the abridged version was still some 400 pages. I never had to read “Dracula” in school, and while, like most people, I’m aware of the general premise of the story, my goal of reading at least one classic a year put this on my spooky-reads list for Halloween. Long story short, A real estate agent, Jonathan Harker, goes to […]

Uneven characters in real and D&D worlds

The Cleveland Heights LGBTQ Sci-Fi & Fantasy Role Playing Club by Doug Henderson

by Leave a Comment

The Cleveland Heights LGBTQ Sci-Fi & Fantasy Role Playing Club has a nice premise: group of queer pals, some of whom are very different from each other, get together weekly for their D&D sessions. Most of the real world characters and issues have a generally cliché but still cute quality to them. Ben is one of the main characters, he’s gay (or at least prefers men), college graduate (degree in history) who lives with his parent and makes spending money selling pop-culture paraphernalia online. He […]

Get your Dragon on

City of Dragons V01 The Awakening Storm by Jaimal Yogis

by 3 Comments

I read City of Dragons V01 The Awakening Storm by Jaimal Yogis right after finishing Messy Roots. I was afraid that they would be too similar and ruin the experience of this second title. Thankfully, their differences made both a delightful reading experience. Now, Yogis does write for the younger crowd (at least 8-9 but probably more 10 to 14), but that older reader of Messy Roots could get lost in the excitement, magical, and even the silly adventures. In City of Dragons, we have […]

Not your regular girl scouts (Triple bingo!)

Lumberjanes, vol 1: Beware the Kitten Holy by Noelle Stevenson and Grace Ellis

by Leave a Comment

CBR13 Bingo: The Wilds Official book description: FRIENDSHIP TO THE MAX! At Miss Qiunzilla Thiskwin Penniquiqul Thistle Crumpet’s camp for hard-core lady-types, things are not what they seem. Three-eyed foxes. Secret caves. Anagrams. Luckily, Jo, April, Mal, Molly, and Ripley are five rad, butt-kicking best pals determined to have an awesome summer together… And they’re not gonna let a magical quest or an array of supernatural critters get in their way! The mystery keeps getting bigger, and it all begins here. I’m not outdoorsy in […]

A sneaky, dark YA fantasy hiding inside the skin of a cliched, predictable YA fantasy.

Dark Rise (Dark Rise, #1) by C.S. Pacat

by Leave a Comment

This did NOT go where I thought it was going. What the flippin’ heck. This book lulled me into complacency, then ripped the rug out from under my feet and pushed me down the stairs, where I landed in a pool of razor sharp knives. I am bleeding out currently. And the thing is! I should have known better! I have read Captive Prince! I know she is tricksy. I should have known she wouldn’t write a cookie cutter YA fantasy book, even though during […]

“There isn’t much time for a plan. This is more of a hunch with scaffolding.”

The Alloy of Law (Mistborn, #4; Wax and Wayne, #1) by Brandon Sanderson

by Leave a Comment

I basically just want to jump right into books two and three immediately but I will wait. Lowering this half a star this time around in acknowledgement that the next two take what’s good here and make it even better. I obviously hadn’t read those yet when I read this the first time! And I don’t want to subtract a whole star from this, because I just love this world and characters so much. In retrospect, I can’t imagine this series not going any further, […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo