Cannonball Read 11

Sticking it to Cancer One Book at a Time

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Murderbot brings me so much joy

Artificial Condition by Martha Wells

Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells

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The last half of 2018 was such a hellhole for me personally that I kind of just stopped posting reviews and one that I missed out on getting to review was the excellent first book in the Murderbot series. I’m not surprised at how popular the series is here as they seems like the perfect Cannonball Read kind of books. Plus, they’re novellas so it’s really easy to tear through them quickly. —> Spoilers below for previous books! <— Artificial Condition (Murderbot #2) – 5 stars ART said, What does it want? To kill all the humans, I answered. I […]

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2/11/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:21 |

A Brief Word from Your Friendly Sentient Killing Machine

All Systems Red (The Murderbot Diaries) by Martha Beck

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Though I adore me some sci-fi, I’ve muddled through so many mediocre novels that I tend to wait for awards season to come around. Last year this aerodynamic novella won everything (Hugo, Nebula, Alex, Locus) so here we are. Since the title contains the whole premise, it’s no spoiler to say that Murderbot—a hacked security construct—is our narrator. It is self-aware, competent, and thoroughly bored guarding a scientific expedition on a remote planet. (Luckily, it has hacked its systems so that it can watch future YouTube during downtime.) For a cyborg Murderbot has plenty of personality and lots of opinions—which […]

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Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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2/9/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:10 |

Our hotbed of mediocrity

Hazards of Time Travel by Joyce Carol Oates

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The title of this review is a quote from the novel to explain the place, our narrator, arrives in a form of political imprisonment where exiles are back in time to a middling university in the late 1950s. It also perfectly defines the novel itself. This is does not even have a lot of potential, but it does have a few small interesting ideas. For one, it’s interesting that the narrator seems to be addressing her contemporary context as an audience instead of us. But that’s about where it ends. It’s dreadfully weak-tea of a novel and the language she […]

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Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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2/8/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:76 |

A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing

The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack by Mark Hodder

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This book has many of the things I love: Steampunk, electricity, Spring-heeled Jack, werewolves, a mystery, time-travel affecting the present, and the implication of liminal space. It also has a glowing recommendation from Michael Moorcock on the back. Note to self: Do not buy any other book Michael Moorcock likes.

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Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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2/7/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:8 |

Just as outstanding as the first book, now I need to seek out The Lady Astronaut short stories

The Fated Sky: A Lady Astronaut Novel by Mary Robinette Kowal

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Fun fact, Robinette is not part of her last name and while it sits in the middle of her name it isn’t technically a middle name either.  She is Mary Robinette, and that is how she prefers to be called.  Both Mary and Robinette are in honor of her grandmothers.  It is not uncommon to find her books misshelved due to this misunderstanding.   The Fated Sky is the second book in the Lady Astronaut duolgy that started with The Calculating Stars.  The alternate timeline Kowal created has humanity rushing to space, to create off planet colonies as temperatures rise on Earth due […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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2/7/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:7 |

Who doesn’t like a sci-fi romp?

Head On by John Scalzi

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Recently on twitter, John Scalzi shared a one-star review of one of his books he found. In the review, the writer was upset that Scalzi wrote easily readable sci-fi “romps”. Like me, Scalzi had a hard time finding why writing something that could be described as a romp would be bad. Romps are usually fun, right? Anyway, all of this is to say that Scalzi’s second foray into the world he established in Lock-in is fun, slick and dare I say another romp. Head On, like the first book in this series, takes place in a world where a flu-like […]

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Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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2/6/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:3 |

“Nothing … was private: only secret, only silent. We ate our tears.”

The Birthday of the World and Other Stories by Ursula K. Le Guin

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  This book is so wildly out of my wheelhouse that I don’t really feel qualified to assess it. I’ve almost never read science fiction and rarely read short story collections, and I’m sure I’ve never read a book that was both. There were some stories I loved and some I hated (luckily, the longer novella at the end hit a solid “liked a lot” on that scale), but without a doubt I now have tremendous respect for Le Guin as a writer. It’s astonishing to me that you can take such potent, human concepts as sexuality, adolescence, religion, duty, […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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2/6/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:2 |

Live long and eat tuna fish

Star Trek Cats by Jenny Parks

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What if Kirk, Spock, and the others were cats?  Well, you would have this picture book.  Scotty, for instance, is of course a Scottish Fold.  Park does wonderful illustrations from Classic Trek.  There is, for instance, scenes from both “The Trouble with Tribbles”, and “Mirror, Mirror” – which is important because I love those episodes.   And yeah, there is the Spock in heat thing.   The book is short, but ideal for the devoted cat lover who is also a Trekkie.

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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2/4/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:9 |


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