Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“A dilemma, my father used to say, is nothing but two bad options.”

One Puzzling Afternoon by Emily Critchley

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I started this book with minimal expectations, having never heard of the book or the author, and I can now say this book wasn’t for me. Overall it was paced too slow and the book was too long for me to find it enjoyable or gripping, but it wasn’t so bad that I stopped outright (plus, it was for a book club and I tend to see book club picks through to the end). The subject matter of this book is heavy and for me […]

Never Forget the Pickles

A Sudden Country by Karen Fisher

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I spent a year or two as the computer lab teacher at my kid’s school, back in the late 90s, and as thus was quite familiar with Oregon Trail.  It, along with Math Blasters and Where in the World Is Carmen San Diego?, was one of the key early educational programs, and I must say, it rocked.  No matter how careful you were about picking the right route, and packing some pickles among your provisions (scurvy!), there was always that random element of the unanticipated.  […]

Hash and Rehash

Cassiel's Servant by Jacqueline Carey

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After years of training, Joscelin Verrail joins the ranks of the Cassiline Brotherhood as a celibate warrior-priest. As such, he’s displeased to find himself assigned to protect the young courtesan Phèdre, never anticipating how it’ll sweep him up into a world of danger and political intrigue. I should say off the bat that I love the Kushiel’s Legacy series, and the first book, Kushiel’s Dart, is one of my favorite books of all time. While I didn’t exactly like Joscelin when he was first introduced, […]

I Was Looking for the “Better” Promised in the Title but it Kept Getting Worse

For Better and Worse by Margot Hunt

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TW: SA of a child  ( I did not know that going into this book, there are no details concerning it). The premise of this novel sounds very promising.  When Nat and Will date in law school they jokingly discuss getting away with the perfect murder and back as a 3L Nat thinks she could do it. They seem to have it all, good jobs, a beautiful home, a son they both love and dote on, family trips to the beach on Sundays and yet? […]

“The great fish moved silently through the night water”

Jaws by Peter Benchley

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Stop me if you’ve heard this one before – there is this village on Long Island, and it’s summer 1974, and there’s this shark and it’s killing people. Which is a problem. It’s a problem because a) dead people and b) this coastal village’s livelihood is based on tourism, namely summer tourism and now the tourists could end up as shark food. So, there is a kind of willful ignorance and pretending everything is fine on behalf of village officials because they need that summer […]

Is this a romance? I’m saying yes.

This Could be Us by Kennedy Ryan

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“So tell us what happened between Oh, my gosh, my inmate husband has a secret baby and I smashed the man who put him in prison,” Yasmen says, resting her chin on her folded hands. “This is some Days of Our Lives shit.” Kennedy Ryan’s Before I Let Go was one of the best books I read in 2022. I can still call up the big emotions between a divorced couple who are trying to co-parent and run a business together while also trying to […]



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