Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“If the measure of success was that I was living a more comfortable, easier life than they had, then why was I simultaneously penalized for it?”

The Donut Trap by Julie Tieu

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I picked up The Donut Trap, put it down and then came back to it. Initially, it was presented as a romance, and it really isn’t, so I had to recalibrate my expectations. It is an absolutely lovely, nuanced, coming of age story, and I’m so glad I read it. Jasmine Tran is a recent college graduate who has stagnated. She barely managed her degree and instead of starting a career and blazing a trail, she is living at home and working in her parents’ […]

Unpopular Opinions about Popular Fiction

All Are Welcome by Liz Parker

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I was definitely excited when I read the summary for this book; a modern romance featuring the wedding of a lesbian couple?! Yes, please. I am craving a lot more diverse and realistically representative fiction in my life lately, and this seemed like a great option. It was suggested to me in one of my book services as a fun summer read. Well damn. I’m sorry to say it wasn’t fun at all. Not all of my books have to be fun, but good lord, […]

Pink Panties and Devilish Men

Wicked and the Wallflower by Sarah MacLean

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  Hoo boy, do I chuckle at my newfound shamelessness. Perhaps one of the best parts of being in my thirties is my solid belief that I just don’t GAF what anybody thinks about me anymore. And in that vein, I have unabashedly thrown myself into a semi-regular consumption of delightfully trashy romance novels! This book easily fits the bill, being a welcome, fun, mostly brainless/unrealistic but somehow sexy lil romp through fantasy land. The story features ridiculous characters, including a comically “plain” female lead […]

A Gothic romance that could have been better

The Death of Jane Lawrence by Caitlin Starling

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[Read as an audiobook from the public library] Sigh. Okay. Y’all, I really, really like Crimson Peak. It’s a weird, sexy, stylish, haunted spun sugar mess of a thing that I will watch any time it’s on. And clearly the author of The Death of Jane Lawrence also likes it. And I do not fault her taste for that. But I feel like she might have some views on the Law of Attraction that we might argue about. Jane Shoringfield is a sensible woman. She […]

Here Kitty Kitty

Brina the Cat Volume 2: City Cat by Giorgio Salati

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Brina the Cat Volume 2: City Cat has cute chapters of solo stories tied together for the crazy adventures of a cat named Brina. This Italian Secret Life of Pets by Giorgio Salati is slightly mature and immature at the same time. All ages can read, but some of the stories are a little “intense” (the mature) as Brina goes missing, or the rats have kidnapped her, and there is a possible ghost. But also, there is a child-like humor and innocence to it as […]

The crime, the punishment, the Americanized reporter

Honor by Thirty Umrigar

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The world of India is opened in a way few know within the pages of Honor by Thirty Umrigar. The Beauty and The Beast of this country with its different cultures, traditions, physical light and ugly are out in the open. When a Hindu woman and her Muslim husband, are attacked by her brothers, killing her husband, an American reporter takes on her story. Not just because another woman was involved in an Honor Killing, but because she is willing to stand up to her […]



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