Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Musashi

The Way of the Samurai by Eiji Yoshikawa

The Art of War by Eiji Yoshikawa

The Way of the Sword by Eiji Yoshikawa

The Bushido Code by Eiji Yoshikawa

The Way of Life and Death by Eiji Yoshikawa

The Book of the Five Rings by Miyamoto Musahsi

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So this historical novel came out in the 1930s, and the introduction here unfortunately calls it the “Gone with the Wind” of Japan, which might be true in terms of the epic scope and readability, but given that I am quite sour on “Gone with the Wind” I hope that is the full connection. Then there’s another connection that the introduction discusses, which is with the James Clavell novel Shogun, which came out about 30 or so years later and tells a similar story against the […]

Not-so-thrilling Thriller

Sundial by Catriona Ward

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I had initially been very excited to read this book – but after finishing The Last House on Needless Street I was wary of looking forward to this reading experience. I still held out some hope that this would be different, but despite being two really different books the experience was pretty similar. Ward writes about abuse – not as a voyeur, there’s not very much of the actual abuse itself in the novel, but the impact of abuse in the longer term. How do people who […]

A Loss of Innocence

Our Town by Thornton Wilder

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Our Town by Thornton Wilder My rating: 4 of 5 stars “Our Town” is one of those plays that takes you by surprise. I first read it in my master’s program in an “Modern American Drama” class. I had heard of the play but never read it. From the beginning, Wilder establishes that this play is unlike others of its time. The Stagemaster (narrator) constantly breaks the fourth wall but also interacts with the characters in the play. There’s audience participation (they’re plants from the […]

Blind Date with a Book

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

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Last spring I read about something called “Blind Date With a Book” that sounded like fun. Libraries apparently do them, and it involves choosing a book, wrapped in paper so you cannot see the title, based on some descriptive words (mystery, romance, other voices, etc). It’s a fun way to change up your reading and maybe try something you wouldn’t have picked for yourself. Over on Etsy, a number of sellers offer this same service for a range of fees and I decided to give […]

matrimony, murder, and black market mischief in post-war London

The Right Sort of Man by Allison Montclair

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CBR Bingo: Series (Sparks & Bainbridge Mysteries #1) I needed some new, lighter mysteries to get me through the dwindling days of early autumn. This popped up in my library recommendations, and since there’s a few of them to work through, I figured I’d give it a try. While there’s no shortage of books set during WWII, there are fewer that actually work through the aftermath of the war, which is its own very distinctive setting. The war is over and won, but London is still in tatters […]

A Satisfying Conclusion (For Now…)

King of Scars by Leigh Bardugo

Rule of Wolves by Leigh Bardugo

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After watching the Shadow and Bone series on Netflix, 2022 became the year of Leigh Bardugo for me – and although I didn’t connect equally to all of her work, overall I’ve very much enjoyed this adventure. I started out with the original Shadow and Bone trilogy, then moved on to the Six of Crows duology, took a brief detour to read the first of the Alex Stern Series, and now I’ve rounded out the year with the King of Scars duology.  For me, these […]



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