Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Destiny or destruction?

The Soulmate by Sally Hepworth

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The Soulmate tells the tale of married couple who have recently relocated to a cliffside home overlooking the pacific ocean. There is only one drawback to their panoramic view: the drop. The drop is where people who reach the end of their tether decide to end their lives. Gabe has become a local celebrity by intervening and helping these lost souls find the will to go on, and his wife, Pippa, couldn’t be prouder. Together with their two children, they seem to have an idyllic […]

The Moon Ain’t No Place to Raise a Kid

Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel

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Across centuries, a random and unlikely set of strangers are all connected by a singular anomaly. For mere moments, they experience some sort of disruption to reality. They are suddenly and inexplicably somewhere else before quickly returning to their original position. The experience is so brief they have struggle fully remembering it, and mainly write it off as a worrying delusion. They are: an early 20th century British gentleman, disowned by his family for dissenting politics and exiled to Canada, a young girl obsessed with […]

Uzumaki

Uzuamaki by Junji Ito

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This is it, the big one, the one Ito to rule them all. Other megafans might argue Tomie should take the place as the top of Ito’s oeuvre (or Shoichi, bleh) but Uzumaki is the only one I’m sure to read every single year. It takes a simple but bizarre premise, “a town cursed by spirals,” and makes it… work. Not just work, it makes it excel. Cursed by spirals makes zero sense, until you see how Ito takes that, begins with a simple personal […]

Not a Disney fairy tale

The Changeling by Victor LaValle

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I recently ‘retired’ due to health reasons, and this was the first book I’ve read since that I couldn’t put down, and I didn’t have to! That’s a pretty cool feeling. One of my medications forbids me to eat for half an hour after taking it, so I’ve been taking it, reading for 30 minutes, then reading some more when I finally get breakfast. It’s awesome.  Apollo and Emma have what they think is a lovely normal life, including Baby Brian. When Emma starts acting […]

An interesting premise, but not one I cared about enough to continue

Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez

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Did not finish It is 1981 in Buenos Aires. Juan and his young son Gaspar embark on a cross-country trip to his late wife’s family compound. It is clear from the beginning that Juan is ill and is still suffering the after-effects of recent heart surgery and the sudden loss of his wife Rosario. This is no ordinary road trip. He is struggling to support his son, who does not understand what is really happening and is traumatized by his mother’s death and his father’s […]

Mimi’s Tales of Terror

Mimi's Tales of Terror by Junji Ito

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I had a very bad day a couple weeks ago and my wife surprised me in response by pre-ordering the latest Junji Ito. I have a very good wife. Mimi’s Tales of Terror adapts an apparently famous Japanese collection of urban legends, Shin Mimibukuro (New Earmuffs), and gives it that trademark Ito horrifying art and pacing. In some ways it’s like watching a handful of Tales from the Crypt or Are You Afraid of the Dark episodes framed through a Japanese perspective. This is one […]



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