Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

That magical unicorn, a successful prequel! (From someone who’s never read the other books.)

Magic Lessons (Practical Magic, #0.1) by Alice Hoffman

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Don’t let your preconceptions keep you from reading this one if it sounds like something you might be interested in. I thought, because I saw the movie adaptation of Practical Magic one time a couple years back, that I knew how Maria Owens’s story would end, because her story is the entire reason that first book exists. That’s how prequels work! The curse she put on her own family as she was killed for being a witch in Salem: that anyone who loved an Owens […]

A perfect example of what modern fantasy can do.

Foundryside (The Founders Trilogy, #1) by Robert Jackson Bennett

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Loved this! Just a straight up great fantasy book right here. Great, unique worldbuilding. Loved the characters. Loved the exciting, heisty plot. Perfect build up to the next book. I just loved it, okay! I think I had this idea from just looking at the cover that this book was going to be kind of dark and dour, and it’s not at all. It’s clever and funny, and yes there are some darker places where the characters experience hardship, but it’s also just a really […]

No really they are a witch

Lola’s Super Club V02 My Substitute Teacher is a Witch by Christine Beigel

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Even if I had read book one of Lola’s Super Club (which I realized after starting this was book two with the subtitle of My Substitute Teacher is a Witch) I do not think I would have liked this book. While kids who like “kid gross humor” and fantasy drama/action/violence will enjoy, it will not be for everyone. I appreciate the attempt of Christine Beigel with their trying to make this book a “girl power superhero book” and using stereotypical “boy stuff” for the plot […]

Coping with this book via Pros and Cons.

A Court of Silver Flames (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #4) by Sarah J. Maas

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This is a book I’ve been avoiding reviewing because I have so many complicated thoughts and feelings about it; it’s overwhelming. Does SJM not provoke complicated feelings in everyone? I feel like she’s very divisive, and it’s not always clear where all the animosity is coming from* (or rather, ‘why’ it’s coming; people who hate her and her books are VERY loud about it, so in that sense it’s very easy to see from whence said animosity is being hurled). And yeah, Maas makes some, […]

a perfect blast of nostalgia from the paranormal past…until the last 30 pages blows it all up

We Ride Upon Sticks by Quan Barry

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A losing field hockey team is sweating themselves half to death. They are being pummeled by every other group on campus; a collection of high school teams from allover New England living the exciting existence of a pre-college summer program. They haul their broken bodies back to the dorms of the UNH campus, exhausted physically and spiritually. The goalie is DONE with this exhaustion. She wants, needs, and expects more for both herself and her beloved team. She, like many teen girls before and after, […]

Which matters more, her past or her present?

The Witch's Daughter by Paula Brackston

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Bess is a witch living in modern times. She also happens to be over 300 years old. She’s just moved into a new house and has caught the attention of a local girl named Tegan. As Bess and Tegan spend time together, Bess recounts tales of her life as a way of instructing Tegan in magic and witchcraft. The tales of Bess’ life are simultaneously cautionary ones about the dangers of powerful men and their relentless pursuit of what they perceive as theirs and about […]



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