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.

 

I just want to see what the performance reviews look like

The Fund: Ray Dalio, Bridgewater Associates, and the Unraveling of a Wall Street Legend by Rob Copeland

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Like the delightful Marie Kondo, I love mess. Especially if it’s someone else’s. Copeland tells the origin story of Ray Dalio, hedge fund phenomenon turned self-help guru. Though an indifferent student in school, Dalio was locked in at his gig as a caddy for the wealthy where he made the connections that led to the establishment of Bridgewater Associates. At first, Dalio obsesses over building a kind of Grand Unified Theory for investing that accounts for the vagaries of geopolitics. Once he has successfully codified […]

I ain’t no fortunate son

The Women by Kristin Hannah

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I have never actually read any Kristin Hannah before but this was the selection for the month for a book club I am in – I know The Nightingale was very popular at one point but I think I just hit the point of wondering how many more World War II novels we needed right around the time it came out? But I also get the the appeal – because World War II, at least from an American perspective, is one that is easy to […]

Do I like short books?

Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan

Boulder by Eva Baltasar

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I find it a lot harder to explain why I liked a book than word vomiting about why it did not work for me. It becomes worse when it’s something I wouldn’t be inclined to like but something about the particular execution worked for me. So bear with me while I betray my academic roots and partake in an exercise of praise-writing. These books deserve that. On paper, Eva Baltasar’s Boulder (incredibly translated by Julia Sanches from the original Catalan) should not have worked for […]

All That Glitters

Hotel Magnifique by Emily J. Taylor

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This was a nicely structured fantasy novel with the kind of plucky heroine I enjoy.  Jani and her younger sister, Zosa, are living grimly in a port town called Durc.  They made the trip to Durc after their mother died so that Zosa could pursue a singing career but four years later, Zosa is no closer to becoming a singer than she was when they arrived and Jani is working at a tannery to try to earn their passage back home (a task that looks […]

“I’d spent my entire life overdosing on uncut escapism, willingly allowing fantasy to become my reality.”

Armada by Ernest Cline

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I recently finished Armada by Ernest Cline – my second read by that particular author, after Ready Player One. And while it did not live up to the first book for me personally, there was still a lot to enjoy about Armada. Gamers saving the world through mad gaming skills is always an enteraining theme. This was a light and fun read, particularly the first half with the setup of our hero (Zack Lightman) and learning how his upbringing and experiences have defined who he […]

Sins of the Fathers

Icarus by K. Ancrum

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CBR Bingo square- Dun Dun I got Icarus by K. Ancrum from a list of retellings of Greek mythology, and it made me do something I never do anymore, I skipped ahead a few chapters to make sure nothing happened to Icarus, who is a child. Yes, he’s a kid in high school, but I needed to make sure he was okay. He is almost a legal adult, but it still freaked me out that he was in the situation he found himself in. Icarus […]



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