Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

It’s true, they do do that

We Solve Murders by Richard Osman

by 2 Comments

We Solve Murders is the first book I read this year, and still the best. It’s by Richard Osman, writer of the Thursday Murder Club series (which I have since started, and which I also like, but not as much). It’s also probably the first of a new series but so far the only entry. The central pair of sleuths here are a father- and daughter-in-law, which is at least fresh. The daughter-in-law is a high-class bodyguard who’s protecting a super-successful later-in-life author whose main […]

With Joe Montanga as Fat Billy

Thinner by Stephen King; Richard Bachman

by 6 Comments

Cbr18 Bingo – Wheels from all the cars in the book, including the one that the protagonist used to kill an old woman. By accident. A recent conversation encouraged me to try Thinner by Stephen King, written as Richard Bachman. The first time I found the story, I recognized it. Not because the story had permeated pop culture by the time I got to it, but because my grandmother used to tell me about the books she read. But she told them as if they […]

Shout out to the crones!

Nettle & Bone: A Novel by T. Kingfisher

by 3 Comments

According to the book cover, this is the story of a princess who dreams of killing a prince rather than marrying one. Just in time for spooky season, this murderous tale has ghosts, witches, goblins, skeletons, fairy godmothers, and curses. And a little bit of romance, too. Nettle & Bone was a funny, exciting read that actually deals with some serious subject matter — spousal abuse — so trigger warning for that. Marra is a princess, the third daughter of the queen of the Harbor […]

E. M. Forster, you absolute gem of a man!

Howards End by E. M. Forster

by Leave a Comment

CBR18 BINGO: Summer, because the tryst between Helen and Paul that starts the plot rolling happens in the summer Double BINGO – Across: Success, Justice, You, Wealth, Summer Down: One, Wheels, Summer, And, Repair After finishing E. M. Forster’s A Passage to India, I had an urge to revisit Howards End, a novel I hadn’t read in close to 40 years.  It was a close race, but I do believe I enjoyed Howards End even more. (Note, this review contains some minor spoilers.) The story […]

“I pictured a section in the ladies’ auxiliary church cookbook for Sudden Death Quick Snacks…using ingredients one could keep on the pantry shelf in the event of tragedy.”

“F” is for Fugitive: A Kinsey Millhone Mystery (#6) by Sue Grafton

by Leave a Comment

Floral Beach, California could barely be called a town: six streets long and three deep, its only notable feature a strip of sand fronting the Pacific. And seventeen years ago Jean Timberlake, promiscuous high schooler, was found strangled on that strip of sand. The people of Floral Beach hadn’t thought of Jean since shortly after her body had been found: Bailey Fowler, the self-confessed killer, had been properly processed and convicted. It didn’t even matter that a year after the conviction,  Fowler walked away from […]

Sometimes I wish my first word was “quote”, so that on my death bed, my last words could be “end quote”.- Steven Wright

I See You’ve Called in Dead: A Novel by John Kenney

by Leave a Comment

Obituary writer Bud Stanley has fallen into a funk, existing (not living) in his own life. Divorced (his wife left him for a coworker, an admittedly more interesting man), half-hearted in his job, Bud’s final straw comes when the blind date a coworker set him up with shows up at the bar just to tell him she’s had a better offer. So, in a case of drunken “wouldn’t it be funny”-ness, he publishes his own obituary in the newspaper he works for. (Who knew that […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo