Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

A sublime take on Groundhog Day

On the Calculation of Volume, Book I by Solvej Balle

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On November 18, Tara Selter wakes up in Paris and goes about her day of meeting with book sellers to view and purchase rare editions for the business she runs with her husband, Thomas. She goes to sleep that night with a plan for November 19, more appointments to keep, more books to consider. When she wakes up, she slowly comes to understand that she is reliving November 18 again. Anyone who has seen the Bill Murray classic (one of my favorite comedies, I’m not […]

“Last week I considered going jogging in flip-flops just to remind myself how sex sounds.”

The True Love Experience by Christina Lauren

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StoryGraph Easy Reading Challenge 25: A book with two authors Felicity “Fizzy” Chen loves her life and career as a romance writer. The problem is that she’s suffering from a bad case of writers’ block, and when she’s asked about her personal life in interviews or author panels, it’s not like she can confess to never actually having been in love, right? A romance writer should surely have experienced romantic love at some point? With all of her friends happily coupled up, she’s also getting […]

A Thrill Ride From Start to Finish

Famous Last Words: A Novel by Gillian McAllister

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Famous Last Words by Gillian McAllister is a suspenseful, thriller/mystery that had me hooked from page one. I hated to put it down and finished it within two days. I had heard about it from Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s substack, a great place to go for book, TV, and movie recommendations. This story involves hostages, murder and the joy of reading, and involves very interesting main characters who struggle with the aftermath of a traumatic event. Camilla is a book editor who loves her job. There’s nothing […]

“I would shiver the whole night through”

Knife River (2024) by Justine Champine

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When it comes to mysteries, I find the plot to be almost the least interesting thing–as long as it’s not too lazy or derivative or actively insulting to the reader, and fits into the vibes of the story. What I do care about, then, are the vibes–if the vibes are there, if the texture of the story is something I can snag myself on, I don’t really worry about clues or reveals (which I’m bad at predicting anyway). The vibes are pretty immaculate in Knife […]

You know it’s good if they don’t want you to read it

Angel of Greenwood by Randi Pink

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Angel of Greenwood is an outstanding YA novel about teenaged love and community set against the backdrop of the 1921 Greenwood Massacre in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Greenwood, the “Black Wall Street”, was wiped out in a vicious act of race-based terrorism with businesses looted and destroyed, houses burned to the ground and an actual bomb dropped on the community. This novel came to my attention because a local school district removed it from the 9th grade reading list, sparking protest from students, their parents and faculty. […]

It appears that 19th century soap opera adventure stories are my thing!

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

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Reviewer Note: In 2024, I started to read the free version of The Count of Monte Cristo that is available from Project Gutenberg (my go-to resource for novels in the public domain). After reading 200 pages, I couldn’t understand why I was so bored. This novel has more action than a Die Hard movie, yet I was struggling to stay interested. I decided to do some research into what’s considered the best translation of this novel, and I found recommendations for the edition translated by Robin […]



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