Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

When there is trouble, call for these cousins

Blue Stars Mission One: The Vice Principal Problem by Kekla Magoon, Cynthia Leitich Smith

by Leave a Comment

Blue Stars Mission One: The Vice Principal Problem is about two cousins, Riley and Maya, who are radically different, but must stop the evil Vice Principal Balderdash (whose name rhymes with Baldera$$ and matches his personality) from taking away all the fun and only have Detention! Of course, the cousins have a rocky start, but with gadgets and a distraction that would make James Bond jealous, they will best their archnemesis! The two girls are different not just because of personalities (Riley is bubbly, artistic, […]

Family History and Mysteries

Tangleroot by Kalela Williams

by Leave a Comment

Gosh, where to start with this book. Tangleroot opens with Noni being forced to give an opening speech to introduce her mother, Radiance, as the new president of Stonepost college, but the speech has been edited because Radiance is pushing to have the college renamed after their ancestor, Cuffee Fortune, who built and opened the college. Noni isn’t able to finish the speech and accidentally hot mics her mom when she reiterates that she didn’t want to the speech. Radiance is a force, and she’s […]

Early Fall Leftovers

To Start A War: How the Bush Administration Took Us Into Iraq by Robert Draper

The Travelers by Chris Pavone

A Walk Among the Tombstones by Lawrence Block

Dark Fire by CJ Sansom

The Menendez Murders: The Shocking Untold Story of the Menendez Family and the Killings that Stunned the Nation by Robert Rand

Stasi Child by David Young

The Cover Wife by Dan Fesperman

So Thirsty by Rachel Harrison

Revelations of Divine Love by Julian of Norwich

Geiger by Gustaf Skördeman

Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001 by Steve Coll

Slow Horses by Mick Herron

The Devil Knows You're Dead by Lawrence Block

by Leave a Comment

I’ve read some interesting stuff lately and I wish I had made more time to document it but life gets in the way that life sometimes does. Not all bad, just life. To Start A War**** I had a long thing here about connecting this to the 2024 election but I don’t want to talk current electoral politics on here, at least the specifics of them. A good book if you want to know the intelligence (ha) perspective of how we wound up in a […]

The Banality of Good

Every Man Dies Alone by Hans Fallada

by Leave a Comment

Otto and Anna Quangel are indifferent toward living under Nazi rule, but when they receive the news that their son was killed in the war, they begin a silent campaign of defiance. There’s a phrase in the afterword that’s used to sum up the central theme of this book – ‘the banality of good.’ There’s plenty of well-known stories of resistance against oppressive powers from all eras – certainly plenty I can recount from World War Two alone, plenty of lives saved and a huge […]

This book tied everything together perfectly

Comanche Moon by Larry McMurtry

by Leave a Comment

I started this book soon after finishing Dead Man’s Walk back in June. I stalled about 100 pages in, and kind of stopped reading.  I didn’t even remember The Vegetarian by Han Kang until my wife asked me about it after hearing that she was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. Han Kang, that is, not my wife (though, I would totally award my wife a Nobel Prize). Anyway. I talked a co-worker of mine into reading Lonesome Dove a few months ago, and he’s […]

Intriguing, but Confusing

The Last Murder at the End of the World by Stuart Turton

by Leave a Comment

The story: A small group of villagers on an island are the last survivors on Earth after a deadly fog wiped out most of humanity. The residents of the village include regular villagers as well as three “elders,” who are scientists that work to keep the fog at bay thanks to a complex security system and lead the island. One morning the villagers awake to discover that one of the scientists has been murdered, and this murder has triggered a change in the security system. […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo