Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Mind your mindfulness

Being a Dog: A Tail of Mindfulness by Maria Gianferrari

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I really dislike the word, mindfulness.  It has taken on a pretentious air of “being better than you.” A feeling of, “I practice mindfulness and you don’t.”  However, I went at Being a Dog: A Tail of Mindfulness with an open mind. Okay, big groan to “tail” verses “tale” but I was able to forgive that with the “yellow snow comment.” (Oh, come on! Unless you are new to my reviews you know I have the humor of a ten-year-old!) The book seems terribly simple. […]

“No Mourners, No Funerals”

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo

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I picked up (and reviewed) the original Shadow and Bone trilogy after watching the Netflix series. At the time I read in various forums (including, I’m pretty sure, other Cannonball Read reviews) that the Grishaverse novels get even better in the spin-offs – and based off of these two books, I have to agree! While I enjoyed the Shadow and Bone trilogy well enough, I didn’t feel they brought anything particularly new or interesting to the fantasy genre, and overall I actually thought that the […]

“.. nothing makes him tick. It just happens all by itself …”

Wolf in White Van by John Darnielle

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I had a hard time getting into this book – it was a combination of the beginning being slow, because the world in this novel is so specific and frankly a bit difficult to get into, and also there was the matter of a book hangover after reading Notes on an Execution. I tried to read a charming fantasy novel (Once Upon a River by Diane Setterfield) and stopped when I only read about 20 pages in a week, which is a good indication that I’m […]

A good start to my year of Helen Garner

The Spare Room by Helen Garner

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As promised to myself, this year I’m making my way through the works of Australian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter and journalist Helen Garner. And wouldn’t you know it, The Spare Room happened to turn up at a ‘swap rather than shop ‘ event with some friends (the clothes swaps having happily extended to books and household items, etc.) This is a short-ish novel that didn’t take long to read but stayed with me for a while after. Over the course of three weeks Helen (yes […]

Topsy Turvy

The Final Girl Support Group by Grady Hendrix

Perfect Remains (Luc Callanach #1) by Helen Fields

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How, exactly, do you decide whether the book you’ve just read is good? I can appreciate books that I struggled my way through, and I’ve torn my way through books that I hated. Clearly enjoyment is one factor and reward is another, but the two books I’ve read in the past week or so kind of threw me for a loop. One of them is right up my wheelhouse. The other, not so much. Yet I ended up loving the latter and disliking the former […]

“The feeling was so strong, so absolute. There was something out there, and it was watching me, and it was hungry.”

Horseman: A Tale of Sleepy Hollow by Christina Henry

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In one word: Puzzling It’s been a minute since I picked up a horror book and grabbed this one on a whim at my local library. I mean, check out that gorgeous cover! We apparently aren’t supposed to judge books by them, but this one snagged my attention. I was very intrigued by the premise of a continuation of the Sleepy Hollow mythos, set thirty years after the horseman allegedly ran Ichabod Craine out of town. Henry starts strong by fitting her story and characters […]



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