Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

I’m basically Reviewer 2 here with this so bear with me

Shadow of Night (All Souls #2) by Deborah Harkness

The Book of Life (All Souls #3) by Deborah Harness

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I didn’t quite make the comparison when I read A Discovery of Witches, the first book in the All Souls Trilogy, but after finishing the set it’s obvious: these are books that are pitched toward fans of Outlander (or books like Outlander that fill in the spaces between major plot twists with lots and lots and lots of small expository details.) It’s probably not a coincidence that Deborah Harkness and Diana Gabaldon both have doctorates and both brought a very academic sensibility to their fiction […]

An interactive high five competition just for you

High Five by Adam Rubin

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I have a cousin that feels if you like an actor/performer/author you will like every photograph/song/book. Yet, that is not always the case. Sometimes an actor looks better with long hair, sometimes short. Sometimes a singer should not do ballads, others should not try to sing a quickie tune. The same goes for authors. And no matter how much I liked Adam Rubin’s Dragons Love Tacos, I cannot fully love High Five. High Five is a cute story about having fun and doing your best […]

The Speed Bump in an Otherwise Smooth Ride

House of Chains by Steven Erikson

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I started reading the Malazan Book of the Fallen last year. I wanted to read a completed epic fantasy series and had heard a lot of good things about it. I had some Audible credits so I got Gardens of the Moon and soon enough, I was engaged, but a bit left behind somehow. This series isn’t something you can just casually listen to as an audio book and really hope to get. I made it about two-thirds of the way through the first audio […]

Not so jolly giant and his Jack

Mighty Jack by Ben Hatke

Mighty Jack and the Goblin King by Ben Hatke

Mighty Jack and Zita the Spacegirl by Ben Hatke

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The Might Jack series by Ben Hatke starts as a separate, but companion series to the Zita the Spacegirl graphic novels. Books One (Mighty Jack) and Book Two (Mighty Jack and the Goblin King) set up Jack’s, Maddy, and Lilly’s adventures. These adventures mirror another story that has a Jack, some magic seeds and a few giants in it. Only, these magic seeds are purchased by trading the family car (not cow) and what grows is not just a beanstalk, but all sorts of creatures […]

Friends! Adventure! Robots! All she needs now is a catch phrase.

Legends of Zita the Spacegirl by Ben Hatke

The Return of Zita the Spacegirl by Ben Hatke

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The graphic novels featuring Zita the Spacegirl are back in two more adventures (from 2012 and 2014). The first (technically second) book is Legends of Zita the Spacegirl #2 and the second (technically third) book is The Return of Zita the Spacegirl. Ben Hatke published Zita in 2011 but had been working on her for years. Both stories flow well and are solid stories. Even though the first two books “wrap up” that books story, there are open endings to each of them. Therefore, it […]

Sherlock vs. Elder gods, round 2

The Cthulhu Casebooks - Sherlock Holmes and the Miskatonic Monstrosities by James Lovegrove

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Middle portions of the trilogy are always difficult. There is not the excitement of starting a story nor the anticipation of a conclusion. So how do you make the middle volume interesting?   In the case of this book the author changed things up a bit and focused much more on the Lovecraftian Elements then in the first book in the series. The strategy is largely successful. Lovegrove incorporates elements from a wide variety of Lovecraft’s tales From his stories involving the dream cycle to […]



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