Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Wish it was something funner

Something Wilder by Christina Lauren

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Lily Wilder is the daughter of a notorious treasure hunter. But when Duke Wilder died he left her little more than a notebook full of clues and riddles that she has ignored for the last decade. She’s making a living out in the desert, giving guided tours to city folk looking for a bit of adventure, when an old flame walks back into her life. Leo Grady was her big love ten years ago, but circumstances separated them and Lily is still heartbroken about it. […]

Maiden voyages

A Restless Truth by Freya Marske

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For my maiden voyage in Cannonball Reads, it is a happy coincidence that my first review is for A Restless Truth by Freya Marske which is a book about a maiden on a voyage both literal and metaphoric. This is the second book in a series about an alternate Edwardian England that involves magicians, a murder mystery, and queer romance. Which is to say, entirely my cup of tea. The first book, A Marvellous Light which I also thoroughly enjoyed, centers on the adventures of Robin and Edwin. This […]

No Code Breaking Necessary to Enjoy this One

The Rose Code by Kate Quinn

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This historical fiction is about women code breakers at Bletchley Park (Officially the Government Code and Cypher School) during WWII. The three main characters, Mab, Osla and Beth are thrown together through Mab and Isla’s arrival at Bletchley Park. Mab is from Shoreditch. She is unabashedly clawing her way out of poverty and aiming toward stability and a better life by marrying up (so to speak). Osla is a socialite, of Canadian birth but English at heart. She has stayed in London to help with […]

“All that lives must die, Passing through nature to eternity.”

Hamnet by Maggie O'Farrell

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It’s a novel about unbearable loss and terrible grief that feels deeply, vibrantly alive. The language is spare, yet lush, because to describe the world rightly can only be lavish, even when the words are simple. A monkey’s paws are described as “black and shiny, like boot leather, with nails like apple pips.” A feverish child’s face is covered with a “sheen of sweat making it glimmer like glass.” A woman in labor sees her child being born, “turning, twisting, slick, like a water creature, […]

Joyce Carol Oates (1)

We Were the Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates

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“We were the Mulvaneys, remember us?” When Joyce Carol Oates slows down she is quite capable of writing very good fiction. This novel from 1996 is one of her more famous and popular novels, and given how many novels she’s written, maybe one of a very few that anyone not otherwise quite familiar with her could name, alongside some of the Wonderland quartet and of course Blonde. The novel is about a family in upstate New York from the 1960s through the 1990s, and it’s […]

Rebecca West (1)

The Fountain Overflows by Rebecca West

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“There was such a long pause that I wondered whether my Mamma and Papa were ever going to speak to each other again.” At times, this is one of the funniest novels I have ever read. It’s slightly overlong at times, and given that there’s two more books in the series, I don’t think that’s going to change. The book is a roman a clef by way of a bildungsroman. I don’t know how much of it directly based on Rebecca West’s life, but if […]



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