Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Intriguing premise (but which I thought was a standalone, reader beware it is not)

The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake

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This is definitely a 3.5 star book rounded down, and after reading an interview with the author that came out literally today I think I understand why (and am more comfortable with the rounding down). I also want to call out a total party foul–there’s no indication that this book is meant to be the first in a series, and if you’re like me and averse to spoilers there’s no way to search around for if there is a second book without potentially running into spoilers. Short […]

“Heirs to thrones don’t have the luxury of saying no.”

The Stolen Kingdom by Jillian Boehme

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A standalone fantasy novel feels like a real unicorn in today’s market, so I was very excited to be able to read something without having to commit to three (five, seven…) books. “If you’re planning treachery against our king, I want no part of it,” I said. “You’re already part of it,” Nelgareth said. “Heirs to thrones don’t have the luxury of saying no.” Mara has a connection to growing things, a magic her mother made her promise to hide from everyone, even her own […]

In which I mostly fuss about things that I wanted to be better

Bridge of Souls by Victoria Schwab

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Given the premise of the Cassidy Blake series (girl with ghost hunter parents can see and gets into trouble with real ghosts), it should be no surprise that the next city to be the setting of an adventure would be New Orleans, LA, USA. Bridge of Souls is on the one hand, better than its immediate predecessor, but on the other, still has some of the same problems. I should say that I do in fact realize this is middle grade fiction, and thus it […]

A Book of Many Lives in Few Words

The Many Lives of Pusheen the Cat by Claire Belton

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Do you want something that is pretty superficial, colorful, involves few words, and much cutsey-ness? You might be interested in The Many Lives of Pusheen the Cat. Pusheen is the chubby tabby star of many GIF and single panel cartoons, and this book is basically just a compilation of the several variations on the character that have been developed over the years. There’s Pusheen herself (the original cat is a she and according to the starts page for each character variant, they are all gendered […]

“There’s no need to build a labyrinth when the entire universe is one.”

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

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Sometimes, when I’m enjoying the world of a book, I start reading slowly and lingering over each passage because I don’t want it to end. Piranesi is just over 250 pages, but I savoured it over the course of two weeks. Susanna Clarke is something of a magician herself. I loved Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell for its atmosphere, likable and/or vivid characters, and subtle humour, and although Piranesi is a completely different sort of book, I loved it for the same reasons. Every single review I have […]

She was all danger, all aerial murder waiting to happen

The Jaguar Knight by Ann Aguirre

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The Jaguar Knight is the final book in the Ars Numina series, which I see I’ve managed to read and reread, but not review. If you are interested, and why wouldn’t you be, you’re going to want to start with the first book, The Leopard King. This final book in the series completes the arc and provides the emotional payoff set up in the first book. Ars Numina is a series of interconnected stories which over 6 books tell the story of allied societies whose […]



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