Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

To see her is to love her

Sapphire Flames by Ilona Andrews

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4.5 stars This is the first book in a new trilogy, so it will work fine to anyone new to the authors or this fantasy world, but readers may want to have read at least Diamond Fire, a novella which introduces the heroine and bridges the completed trilogy and this new one. In a world where magical abilities bring wealth, power and possibly even fame, Catalina Baylor has reluctantly become the head of House Baylor and the main investigator of her family’s detective agency, after her […]

Pro: It Was Short

White is for Witching by Helen Oyeyemi

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I am seriously going to hard pass on future books by Helen Oyeyemi. I don’t get them/like them and they feel like too much effort to finish. I should not struggle to understand what the author is trying to convey while reading this much. The writing is just broken sentences and thoughts. I don’t even know who was who until I got to around page 30 or 40 or something like that. I stopped paying attention. I think once again that Oyeyemi was trying to […]

Like a tea-tray in the sky

Bernard Pepperlin by Cara Hoffman

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Overall, Bernard Pepperlin is a sweet story. We have a hero mouse, with a familiar past, showing what the little guy can do. The story of Bernard (aka The Dormouse of one famous tea party), is one of courage, community, friendship and even, mistakes. The introduction by Cara Hoffman tells how Bernard came to life by telling about special friends, young sons and lots of hard work. Her text is smooth and well done. The illustrations are sparse, but what Olga Demidova has done is […]

Life is too short for books you don’t want to read

Wicked by Gregory Maguire

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There can come a time when a book is a chore and let’s be real – I’m three weeks out from my wedding, I have enough goddamn chores. I hadn’t gotten quite halfway through when I consciously uncoupled myself from this book and I have no real desire to go back and finish it in the week I have remaining on my library loan. For my Retelling bingo square, I revisited a book I didn’t much care for the first time around either. I was […]

And the serious plot begins

Academ's Fury by Jim Butcher

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In this, the second book of the Codex Alera, we move past the starter villains of the first book and really kick the ongoing plot lines into gear. In the first book Furies of Calderon we are introduced to our 15 year old protagonist Tavi and finish with him being offered a scholarship from the ruler of Alera  (Gaius Sextus) to his academy. In book 2 we start with the 17 year old Tavi still being an outsider due to his lack of magic, bullied […]

Utterly bleak and black is not the sum of realism. All the other colors are real, too.

The Hallowed Hunt by Lois McMaster Bujold

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This is the third published, but earliest chronological novel in the World of the Five Gods/Chalion series by Lois McMaster Bujold. In it, a crowned prince has just been found dead, bludgeoned by his own war hammer, and the Lady Ijada is the only likely culprit. She claims self-defense, but her seemingly willingness to go to the prince is being used against her. We meet her now en route, with the prince’s body, with noble/captain Ingrey who has been charged with bringing both for an […]



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