Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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This was fun. Exhilarating. This was my chaos.

Petty (Cape & Cowl 1) by S.A. Sommers

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The pharmacy was perfect, and I was only there for the cash. And maybe a new foundation. Eyeliner. Shampoo. Oh, and maybe some chocolate. The manager nodded at one of the employees, who sprinted off to the cosmetics area. “Maybelline!” I called. “Warm ivory!” “Rich alabaster would be better!” she yelled back. ― S.A. Sommers, Petty ************ Farrier folded his arms across his massive chest and leaned against the desk. “We have all these visible heroes. Flying around, running around, leaping over shit. Saving the […]

A master distills fantasy down to its essence

Treacle Walker by Alan Garner

The Owl Service by Alan Garner

The Weirdstone of Brisingamen by Alan Garner

The Moon of Gomrath by Alan Garner

Boneland by Alan Garner

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Bingo (In order):  Guide, Relationships, Nostalgia, Europe, Adulthood Passport: England When Alan Garner’s Treacle Walker was shortlisted for the 2022 Booker Prize I was surprised, not because I don’t think he’s a brilliant writer worthy of a major literary award, but because awards like this don’t seem to take fantasy seriously, despite the depth of the ideas and the beauty of the prose, and I hadn’t realised that this author I loved in my childhood was still alive and still writing.  Treacle Walker is not […]

On the road to nowhere

Nomadland by Jessica Bruder

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Bingo: On the Road; Passport: USA Jessica Bruder’s Nomadland documents several years of immersion into the subculture of vandwellers, people who call themselves houseless rather than homeless, living in their vehicles and moving between seasonal jobs such as camp hosting in national parks, Amazon’s Camperforce, and harvesting crops.  The narrative follows a number of members and leaders of the vandweller community, but the focus character is Linda May who lives  with her dog Coco in a 1974 ten-foot trailer towed behind a Jeep. Like most […]

Another one of those moments when Ruby had to choose whether to go crazy or just deal. A close call this time.

Lovecraft Country by Matt Ruff

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“It never fails,” Montrose said. “No matter what they do to you, afterwards it’s like nothing happened. You’re supposed to just be grateful you’re still breathing.” Upon receiving a letter from his estranged father, Atticus Turner returns to his hometown to discover his father missing. He and his uncle George follow the trail to Ardham, Massachusetts, where, with the help of their hometown friend Letitia, they learn secrets about Atticus’s late mother’s family history, and how he and his family could be the keys to […]

“Oh wretched little one—just like evildoers, the wretched don’t die easy.”

Beauty is a Wound by Eka Kurniawan

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From the very first page: “One afternoon on a weekend in March, Dewi Ayu rose from her grave after being dead for twenty-one years. A shepherd boy, awakened from his nap under a frangipani tree, peed in his shorts and screamed, and his four sheep ran off haphazardly in between stones and wooden grave markers as if a tiger had been thrown into their midst. It all started with a noise coming from an old gravesite with an unmarked tombstone covered in knee-high grass, but […]

Fantastic Book, Wrong Reading Mood

Witch King by Martha Wells

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Kaiisteron awakes to find a minor mage trying to use his mage.  It doesn’t end well for the mage.  After being murdered and having his consciousness trapped for who knows how long, Kai has a lot of questions, and he’s not liking the answers so far.  As he sets out to figure out both what happened to him and what’s currently going on, Kai will have to gather his friends and family close and figure out both who to trust and what his path forward […]



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