Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Picture book round up part… I’ve lost count

The Mighty Pollinators by Helen Frost

Too Much!: An Overwhelming Day by Jolene Gutierrez

Steve Irwin by Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegar

by Leave a Comment

Helen Frost will have a new pollen book at the end of March-early April 2024 called The Mighty Pollinators. No, this is not a book and/or graphic novel about a new DC or Marvel movie of superheroes, but it is a book about the critters, insects, buggies, and even the wind, and how they make your garden, flowers, and more, grow. This is all done with fairly shorter poems that allow for the facts to be presented, but also in a fun and quick manner. […]

Feeling fear

Why Are We Afraid? by Fran Pintadera

by Leave a Comment

Finally a review about a book that is currently out and you do not have to wait a year (okay five months) for! Why Are We Afraid? is billed as  a children’s book. However, the more mature theme and the slightly adult illustrations make this story not for the very young or sensitive reader.  Frank Fran Pintadera’s story is interesting, and for the right reader, an interesting exploration of fears, but not easy to work with. Overall, the theme of fear done in a poetic […]

I’m a proud Odd Duck myself

Monti and Leo: A Newcomer in Pocketville by Sylvie Kantorovitz

Odd Duck by Sara Varon and Cecil Castellucci.

by Leave a Comment

Monti and Leo: A Newcomer in Pocketville was a “like” read for me, but not a LIKE read.  I enjoyed Sylvie Kantorovitz’s tale of two friends, but there were things that just felt “eh” to me. It was not so much the simplities of the illustrations (sometimes I am a fan of a causal approach; sometimes not as much) as they are expressive in their minimalist detailings, but perhaps something was not moving in the direction I was looking for.  The story is about the […]

How incompetent must a man be to turn a simple hymen breaching into one of the biggest Society scandals in years?

A Tempest at Sea by Sherry Thomas

by Leave a Comment

CBR15 PASSPORT (Stamp #14 : Books From Different Countries. International Waters count I think?) CBR15 BINGO (Relation “ship” Square: Takes place on an actual ship, all sorts of relationships: mother/daughter, romantic, friendship) The seventh novel in Thomas’ Lady Sherlock series is steeped, as they all are, in gender and class politics. Reputation goes hand in glove with those themes and this book really does a deep dive into those murky waters. Again, this is the 7th in the series so spoilers abound. On the run from […]

You weren’t a son, but you are everything you ought to be.

Hang the Moon by Jeannette Walls

by Leave a Comment

CBR15 BINGO: (Politics Square: the politics of prohibition, organized crime, and a family dynasty running ALL of the politics of a rural Virginia town) I’m a big fan of Jeannette Walls so this one was put on hold at the library before its publication. Set in rural Virginia during Prohibition, it seemed right up my alley. Give me a flapper, some bathtub gin (or in this case, moonshine), some small-town organized crime, and digging in! Walls’ does write about what she knows in terms of setting. […]

I have been a character and I have been a narrator, but now I don’t know what I am.

Or What You Will by Jo Walton

by Leave a Comment

CBR15 PASSPORT (Stamp #13: Different Genres, Metafiction) CB515BINGO: (Europe square. Takes place in Florence, Italy. The city is very much a character in the book.) This is the right book for the right person but I am not that right person. Trying to summarize the plot here is going to be problematic because there are a lot of threads weaving this story. Here goes. A woman, Sylvia, is living in Florence, Italy as she nears the end of her battle with cancer. Sylvia is a successful author […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo