Cannonball Read 11

Sticking it to Cancer One Book at a Time

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52: My dive into the pool involved a book that was just okay.

The Pearl That Broke Its Shell by Nadia Hashimi

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Before the review, a disclaimer: I decided that a triple Cannonball or greater would not be feasible or even fun with my current workload. I’m working a few jobs and trying to shoehorn research in (on my own time and dime, because adjunct faculty do not get time built into our jobs), all while trying to hold a few church offices. Last year, I had a really hard time reviewing enough books and I have barely made my reading goals the last two years in a row. I thought a slower pace would suit me best, because the whole point […]

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6/19/2018 's CBR10 Review No:52 |

51: An intriguing play that riffs off Plato’s cave allegory

The Shadow of the Hummingbird by Athol Fugard

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I’m developing a “new global literature” online course, which means lots of lovely reading! For each of the literature courses I have developed, I like to implement a variety of genres. Further, since this is global literature, I need to think about several nations or regions being represented that are not European or Western in focus. Finally, since this is “new” global literature, I decided that everything needed to be published after 9/11, as a starting point to thinking about how globalization changed. This is all a very long preamble to my review, but that’s the reason I read a […]

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6/19/2018 's CBR10 Review No:51 |

50: Revisiting a haunting and beautiful dystopian novel

Future Home of the Living God by Louise Erdrich

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The Chancellor has June’s book club pick for our friend group, and he chose Future Home of the Living God, much to my enormous delight. I read and reviewed this about seven months ago for CBR 9, so I am going to plunk that link right here and just talk about my response for this re-read. Because I loved it even more than the first time I read it. I think we’re going to have a rollicking discussion this month, because a few of us loved it, and The Chancellor DID NOT. This time around, the theme of uncertainty really […]

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6/10/2018 's CBR10 Review No:50 |

49: An okay VR novel

Arena by Holly Jennings

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I had never heard of Holly Jennings or Arena before my library book club assigned it, but that’s the beauty of reading new books and authors you never knew existed. I am also not a video gamer at all, so the content is unfamiliar. Sometimes, I learn a lot, and other times, I learn to gut through a book in order to finish and be able to discuss it with other people. This book, I am afraid, falls into the latter category for me. Kali Ling is an interactive gamer for a tournament. She’s part of a team which must […]

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6/10/2018 's CBR10 Review No:49 |

48: An intriguing new novel

Manhattan Beach by Jennifer Egan

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I’m a sucker for new books, but I don’t often read them, because of time limits, my library tower (graduated from stack), and my enormous TBR list in general. My sister recommended Jennifer Egan’s Manhattan Beach, and I saw it available at my library and put it in my basket on a whim (yes, I have officially gotten greedy to the point of getting basketfuls of books from the library—it’s a new first for me!). It was a great book to read on the airplane from my Florida vacation, and an interesting summer read in general. I have not read […]

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6/10/2018 's CBR10 Review No:48 |

47: An okay emergent YA novel from a great talent.

When I Was the Greatest by Jason Reynolds

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I greatly enjoy Jason Reynolds’ voice in young adult literature. I think his works are necessary to adding diverse literature for young adult readers, and I have liked his novels to this point. Since I read and LOVED All American Boys  and Long Way Down, I think I may have a hard time going back to his first books (case in point: The Boy in the Black Suit was just okay). So I had that in mind when I read When I Was the Greatest, which is apparently trending at my library. Ali is fifteen and lives in a brownstone […]

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6/10/2018 's CBR10 Review No:47 |

46: An uneven and somewhat disappointing debut

The Poppy War by R.F. Kuang

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I was trawling the library’s New Books shelves (as you do when the school year is over, and you can easily read a stack of books in a few weeks), and R.F. Kuang’s debut novel The Poppy War caught my eye. I am trying to read more work by women of color, and science fiction/fantasy is not always the easiest to come by. I decided that this book held an intriguing premise, and I was curious to see how it would pan out. I read this book over my Florida vacation (complete with a Sunday morning where my nephew and […]

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6/10/2018 's CBR10 Review No:46 |

45: The most important book I’ve read this year.

Mothers of Massive Resistance by Elizabeth Gillespie McRae

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I really am not exaggerating when I make this proclamation: Mothers of Massive Resistance may be the most crucial book I have read this year. I am not joking, I swear. As a white woman, I have been working diligently to do my part in activism, namely, owning up to the ways in which white women have participated in the oppression and suppression of women of color. It’s unglamorous, introspective, and uncomfortable work, but it’s one of the most vital things I can do to make real progress and use my privilege to lift up people of color in this […]

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6/10/2018 's CBR10 Review No:45 |


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