Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Next time, can I have a little less science fiction?

On a Sunbeam by Tillie Walden

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On a Sunbeam worked best for me when it kept it personal between Grace and Mia. I found myself begrudging the author anytime we’d shift back to the present because I wanted to see more of the two of them growing close. Maybe it was because the science fiction aspects didn’t quite work for me, and the present was ridden with them. Maybe I just didn’t connect to any of the members of the ship the same way I did to Mia and Grace. If […]

Family defines you, so choose wisely

Stone Fruit by Lee Lai

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In Stone Fruit, Bron and Ray help parent Ray’s single-mother sister’s daughter Nessie, retreating with her into a fantasy world largely of Bron’s creation. Nessie readily takes to it, and the three of them seem like a happy family. That is, until Ray’s sister calls and you realize the situation. She seems to harbor negative feelings towards Bron, or at least that’s how Ray interprets things, and pleads for more structure her child when she’s with the two of them. From here, the cracks start […]

The Things They Carried

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien

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I first read this book in college because it had been assigned in a class I almost took, and then regretted that I didn’t take. Once I read it, I immediately read several more of Tim O’Brien’s books. Later, he visited my college and gave a talk, an incoming student conference, and I was dismayed that he recycled so much from his books for his talk. I get it now. And that’s what has been the experience of rereading this book. I last reread it […]

“Men were too often nervous to learn of things that contradicted their dearest falsehoods.”

The King at the Edge of the World by Arthur Phillips

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You know that feeling you have when an author you love has a new novel out? When you scoop it up and get to reading, because previous novels have dazzled you? When you dig in with excitement and anticipation because you know it’s gonna be great? And then you get to the last page and realize it was. . .  fine? Arthur Phillips has written two of my favorite novels of the 21st century: The Egyptologist and The Tragedy of Arthur. Granted, Kim’s Favorite Novels […]

Narcos

The Cartel by Don Winslow

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Years ago, I read Robert Andrew Powell’s This Love Is Not For Cowards. Powell, a US journalist moved to Juarez, Mexico at the time when it was the most dangerous metropolitan area on earth. He did it to follow the local football (soccer) team, learn about its fan culture and what it meant to be so devout to a team while existing in a war zone. A scene from that book has stuck with me almost ten years since I read it. Powell reports on a shooting […]

The Sun Also Rises

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

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Hemingway gets a lot of shit, but boy when he wrote his first novel, he wrote a perfect one. That’s my recommendation by the way. If you’re going to write a novel, write a perfect one. The first time I read this book I didn’t really understand why Jake and Brett didn’t just get together. As far as a reason, this one is a doozy. Jake of course has been injured in the war, specifically receiving shrapnel while flying a mission. His injury has left […]



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