Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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Featured Review Archive

These reviews, which were promoted in CBR social media, on our homepage, and in Pajiba Love, appear below by review publication date, not by date featured.

 

Blah Blah Blah Girl Power

Girl Dinner by Olivie Blake

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I got tired of waiting for a hold of this at the library so I bought a copy. It’s very very pink. I am tempted to leave it in someone’s free library. Girl Dinner‘s main conceit is on the cover with the fork and the drops of blood. Every member of The House, the most exclusive sorority that is never named on the University campus that is never named eats people. The story alternates between the point of view of Nina Kaur a sophmore pledging […]

Review: The Life and times of Miss Marple by Anne Hart

The Life and Times of Miss Jane Marple by Anne Hart

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  I recently told my students that fanfiction is not a recent invention.  It somewhat surprised them, but it’s true.  Take for instance this book, written with the blessing Christie’s daughter. What Anne Hart presents is a biography of the fictional character Miss Marple.  She draws upon details that appeared in the Miss Marple series of novels, and the book includes a partial filmography of the character.  (In my edition, the most “recent” version listed is the Joan Hickson ones). Hart gives a detailed description, […]

Ferrante did it better

The Book of Goose: A Novel by Yiyun Li

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Cbr18bingo – Bird Almost as soon as I started reading The Book of Goose, I was reminded of Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels. Both Ferrante’s series and Li’s The Book of Goose feature impoverished girls living in post-WWII Europe. Both feature a friendship that can be competitive and dysfunctional. And both focus on the creative process of writing as well as the strains on childhood friendships when people grow up and apart. I loved Ferrante’s series. I liked this novel, but I might have liked it […]

Stephanie Plum Step Aside

Knife Skills by Wendy Church

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This novel is marketed toward Janet Evanovich fans who appreciate a spunky, messy, crime-solving heroine. Author Wendy Church provides similar appeal with less madcap characters, more depth and a tight plot. I’d classify “Knife Skills” as an action crime thriller. Sagarine Pfister is quickly introduced as reckless and impulsive. She also gets to be a confident, competent and gifted chef. Upon becoming mixed up with the mob, danger manages to both lead and follow her. Sagarine’s ambition, stubbornness and sense of responsibility drive the story. […]

Early Jazz 101

Young Man with a Horn by Dorothy Baker

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A short sharp and brilliant novella written by Dorothy Baker in 1938.  Often called the first jazz novel, it is loosely based off the life of Bix Beiderbecke, a white trumpeter who generally played with black bands, in this era of Jim Crow, and who died young of alcoholism.  Baker nailed the 1920s era, where swing was still just starting to take root, and dance bands were emerging, but then there was jazz, for those who preferred to actually listen to the music. Lady knows […]

The Tapestry of Fate: Supporting women’s rights…and women’s wrongs.

The Tapestry of Fate by Shannon Chakraborty

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Tapestry of Fate picks up shortly after the ending of the Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi, and is deeply related to some of the happenings towards the end of the first book. So, there will be spoilers below for the Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi. Amina has been granted super-human abilities and tasked with finding five Transgressions. Well, four after the Moon of Saba. We get a small glimpse at Amina, Dalila, Tinbu, and Majed’s adventure to collect the second Transgression early on in the book, but […]



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