Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time
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I wish for more

The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories by Mahvesh Murad, Jared Shurin, eds.

January 5, 2019 by ElCicco Leave a Comment

I picked up this 2017 collection of short stories because it featured contributions of several writers whose work I’ve reviewed before and liked, and the subject of djinn (or jinn or genies, whatever term you prefer) has been popping up on my radar quite a bit lately. The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories was a brilliant way for me to start CBR11 — immensely entertaining, sometimes provocative, and an entree to the works of writers new to me but whose work I will definitely be tracking down. The stories are a wonderful mix of styles and settings and shed light not only on the nature of the djinn but on human nature as well. The djinn, created by Allah from smokeless fire, are sometimes depicted as tricky and/or evil, but in some ways they are no different from humans.

Filed Under: Fantasy, Fiction, Short Stories Tagged With: #fantasy, cbr11, ElCicco, Fiction, Jared Shurin, Mahvesh Murad, short stories, The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories

ElCicco's CBR11 Review No:1 · Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Short Stories · Tags: #fantasy, cbr11, ElCicco, Fiction, Jared Shurin, Mahvesh Murad, short stories, The Djinn Falls in Love and Other Stories ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Perhaps nothing is certain in this world, but at least we can believe in something.

Killing Commendatore by Haruki Murakami

Elevation by Stephen King

January 4, 2019 by ingres77 Leave a Comment

Killing Commendatore (4 stars) There were parts of this book that brought me back to my favorite parts of 1Q84, but this book doesn’t equal that one in terms of quality, spirit, or impact. Which doesn’t make this a bad book – by any measure – but I don’t think it’s amongst Murakami’s greatest works. The protagonist of this book is unnamed. He’s an artist who’s fallen into portrait painting to make a living. His wife abruptly tells him that she wants a divorce, and […]

Filed Under: Fantasy, Fiction Tagged With: elevation, haruki murakami, killing commendatore, Stephen King

ingres77's CBR11 Review No:2 · Genres: Fantasy, Fiction · Tags: elevation, haruki murakami, killing commendatore, Stephen King ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

Oh h*ck I’m gonna buy the whole series

Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas

January 4, 2019 by lowercasesee 4 Comments

A wiser Cannonballer than I described Sarah J. Maas’s A Court of Thorns and Roses series as great hangover reads and I was tempted to extend that to her Throne of Glass series but these aren’t so much “stall your pain” as “forget the world”. And with the way the world is right now, I could do with a whole lot of forgetting. Again, I reiterate, these books are not good. Yet somehow I can’t put them down. I start reading and look up and HOURS have passed […]

Filed Under: Fantasy, Fiction Tagged With: sarah j maas

lowercasesee's CBR11 Review No:4 · Genres: Fantasy, Fiction · Tags: sarah j maas ·
Rating:
· 4 Comments

Damned by high expectations – An ARC review

The Ruin of Kings by Jenn Lyons

January 4, 2019 by KatSings Leave a Comment

Full disclosure up front: This was an ARC that I won in a contest on GoodReads. This book is not released until February. I am a HUGE fantasy nerd. The words “epic fantasy series” make me happy. When I won a contest to read what was touted as the fantasy star of 2019, I was thrilled. Then I read the inside cover where it is described as “Uniting the worldbuilding of a Brandon Sanderson with the storytelling verve of a Patrick Rothfuss”and suddenly I was […]

Filed Under: Fantasy, Fiction Tagged With: #fantasy, ARC, cbr11, Jenn Lyons, KatSings

KatSings's CBR11 Review No:1 · Genres: Fantasy, Fiction · Tags: #fantasy, ARC, cbr11, Jenn Lyons, KatSings ·
Rating:
· 0 Comments

A promising start for a new author

The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert

January 3, 2019 by crystalclear 3 Comments

So, we have Alice and her mother Ella living a fairly transient lifestyle.  They seem to constantly run in to bad luck. Things catch fire, or strange things happen, and Alice even gets kidnapped once.  Ella’s mother, Althea, is an author of a book, Tales from the Hinterland.  It’s a book of dark fairy tales that is no longer published, but has a fanatical cult following.  It’s also a book that Alice has never read, despite her efforts to find a copy. One day they […]

Filed Under: Fantasy Tagged With: cbr11, Fairy Tales, Melissa Albert, The Hazel Wood

crystalclear's CBR11 Review No:2 · Genres: Fantasy · Tags: cbr11, Fairy Tales, Melissa Albert, The Hazel Wood ·
Rating:
· 3 Comments

Not starting the year off right

Ogre Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine

January 3, 2019 by crystalclear 1 Comment

This is a prequel to Ella Enchanted.  (The book, not the movie starring  Anne Hathaway, which is very different from the source material.) Evie (Evora) is a young girl who is on her way to be a fairly talented physician when her world turns upside down.  Her best friend Wormy (Warwick) decides to propose to her, and sensing a proposal, the Fairy Godmother Lucinda shows up.  When Evie says “Thanks, but no thanks,” Lucinda turns her into an ogre, with a time limit of 62 days […]

Filed Under: Children's Books, Fantasy, Fiction, Young Adult Tagged With: Anne Hathaway couldn't fix this mess, cbr11, Ella Enchanted, Gail Carson Levine, Magic + complaining, not good, Ogre Enchanted

crystalclear's CBR11 Review No:1 · Genres: Children's Books, Fantasy, Fiction, Young Adult · Tags: Anne Hathaway couldn't fix this mess, cbr11, Ella Enchanted, Gail Carson Levine, Magic + complaining, not good, Ogre Enchanted ·
Rating:
· 1 Comment
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