Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Fascinating Philosophy and Science in an OK Story

The Quantum Revelations by Stuart Heinrich

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I’m immensely appreciative of Stuart Heinrich for undertaking quite a project – sharing complex and niche scientific ideas such as physical relativism and quantum cosmology with a general audience of sci-fi/speculative fiction readers in novel form. Think The Celestine Prophecy, but for science! Heinrich has previously published non-fiction articles on similar topics, and The Quantum Revelations is his attempt to integrate these areas of study into fiction. The plot is fun. In the near future, climate change rapidly accelerates past the point of no return. […]

My first introduction to OnlyFans

Margo's Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe

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CBR17Bingo: “Work” – Because Only Fans is definitely work I had never heard of Margo’s Got Money Troubles (2024) by Rufi Thorpe when my book club picked it as our next read. I was only told that the main character does OnlyFans, so I was intrigued, but I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I ended up listening to this one on Audiobook. I really enjoyed this novel. Margo is a very likeable protagonist. She is smart, resourceful, and works hard to protect those she loves. I […]

The other Amazonian princess

Nubia: Too Real by L. L. McKinney

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What do you do when the reader copy you are reading is missing the last 20 pages or so? You holler loudly and say, “Darn you whomever made this reader copy! I need to know what happens in Nubia: Too Real by L. L. McKinney and illustrated by Robyn Smith.” You then say, “Well I guess late September/early October won’t come soon enough!” And then you tell yourself you’ll be first in line to get the finished copy and find out what happens to our […]

Sad books that help make it better

The Fabric of Us by Aditi Anand

Where Are You, Eddie? A Companion to Michael Rosen's Sad Book by Michael Rosen and Gill Smith

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This is a review that seems like another review about a book I almost didn’t write up, but it is not really. Oh, yes, I almost did not write up The Fabric of Us by Aditi Anand (due later May 2026; read via an online reader copy) because I could not think of enough words for a full review. At least not by itself. It was only when I read  Where Are You, Eddie? A Companion to Michael Rosen’s Sad Book by Michael Rosen and […]

Tough read for animal lovers

The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

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Bingo Square: O I don’t really consider myself a huge horror reader – I know I definitely read more horror than I watch and yet, when I finished this book, thinking, “this isn’t the horror I normally read,” I also couldn’t think of what I would consider “normal for me” horror. I have read a decent amount of ghost stories and vampire novels but my brain classifies those as supernatural or ghost and vampire stories vs. categories them under the horror label. I’ve read a […]

Not Exactly Mexican Gothic, But Close Enough

The Bullet Swallower by Elizabeth Gonzalez James

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cbr17bingo Border Now this was an interesting one.  Mexican Gothic is my jam, and I thought that this would be along that vein, but it turned out to be definitely its own thing – an intriguing cross between fictionalized family lore and magical realism.  And when I looked up the translation of Part Two – El Tragabalas, I discover that it is the book’s title in Spanish, but it is also the title of a fairly well known Mexican movie from the mid-60s, and the […]



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