Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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Beyond the Wall

Berlin Game by Len Deighton

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My wife and I honeymooned in Berlin. A lot of folks are surprised by this but we’re not beach people. We like to explore histories, interesting cultural icons, the unusual. Berlin was perfect for that. We had a great nine days there and it was a good start to our marriage. Berlin is sort of a Frankenstein’s monster of a city: a pastiche of prewar romanticism, total ruin, capitalist-western occupation and totalitarian communist occupation make up a sort of fascinating urban landscape. It is doing […]

Anti-Fascist Protection Rampart

Beyond the Wall: A History of East Germany by Katja Hoyer

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I’ve been searching for interesting books about Soviet bloc countries. Specifically, ones about East Germany. I’ll admit that much of my fascination has to do with my adoration for the TV show “The Americans,” and the somewhat idealistic view us Gen-Xers and Millennials have of growing up in America in the 1980s and 1990s (looking at you Stranger Things). The narrative about life in East Germany was so controlled, especially in news and entertainment, that I knew very little about East Germany other than their […]

Spies Alive

The Torqued Man by Peter Mann

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The Torqued Man is a very difficult novel to pull off. It has to accurately replicate the atmosphere of Nazi Germany in World War II, introduce two queer heroes enmeshed with each other without the Tragic Homosexual trope, present a novel-within-the-novel that tweaks the story without it losing momentum. become a high wire spy tale in the tradition of Furst and LeCarré, and do all of this in a way that entertains while seamlessly blending multiple genres. And man oh man does Peter Mann do it. […]

Vacation Reading

Stonewall: The Definitive Story of the LGBT Rights Uprising that Changed America by Martin Doberman

The Pursuit of Pearls by Clara Vine

Lust, Caution by Eileen Chang

While Justice Sleeps by Stacey Abrams

The Rocksburg Railroad Murders by K.C. Constantine

March Violets by Philip Kerr

Can't Knock the Hustle: Inside Brooklyn's Season of Hope: How Basketball Helped Us Survive Power, Politics, and a Global Pandemic by Matt Sullivan

The Lime Pit by Jonathan Valin

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I was on vacation last week and, as you can tell from the stack in the header, I read a LOT… Stonewall: The Definitive Story of the LGBT Rights Uprising that Changed America **** I wish this had focused more on the Uprising itself, as opposed to being a semi auto-biography on those who were involved in it. But it’s still a fascinating story at the nascent days of the LGBTQIA+ Movement, the challenges and complexities, and what emerged from it. A good gateway into learning […]

Conspiracy of Fools

Wedding Station by David Downing

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I don’t know what to make of David Downing’s Station series. On the one hand, I frequently read historical fiction that explores the pitfalls of life in Nazi Germany. Philip Kerr’s Bernie Gunther series is the best example but there are others in the popular “Nazi Noir” subgenere and Downing’s series is one of them. Downing gets the atmosphere of prewar Berlin down in an effective, readable way. I visited Berlin before and while it’s far removed from its Nazi past, the environment of low […]

Lyrical, Soulful, Compelling

Half Blood Blues by Esi Edugan

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I’ve been wanting to read Half Blood Blues, Esi Edugan’s Giller prize-winning, Booker prize-shortlisted novel, ever since it came out in 2011- its only taken a “Music” bingo square to finally get me there.  Half-Blood Blues is a beautifully written, deeply layered, and historically fascinating novel about a group of mixed-race jazz musicians in Paris and Berlin during the wild interwar years.  The novel opens in Paris in 1941, when one of the band members gets ‘pinched’ by the occupying Nazis. From this navel, the […]



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