Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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Magical Reads That I Come Back To Again and Again

The Magicians of Caprona by Diana Wynne Jones

Witch Week by Diana Wynne Jones

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I think I’ve already extolled the virtues of this series at length here before, so I’ll just say that this is one of my favorites of all time and I am completely biased in favor of these books. I am a lifelong Chrestomanci fan and re-read a couple of these about once a year. This year I took on The Magicians of Caprona and Witch Week, which I was less obsessed with as a kid so I don’t remember the plots quite as well, which […]

Before Harry Potter, There was Diana Wynne Jones

The Chronicles of Chrestomanci: Vol. I Charmed Life by Diana Wynne Jones

The Chronicles of Chrestomanci: Vol I The Lives of Christopher Chant by Diana Wynne Jones

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I was reminded of Diana Wynne Jones when reading Gaiman’s The View from the Cheap Seats. I had a vague recollection of knowing her name, and decided to go check out her work. It turns out, I was a huge Jones fan as a child and just didn’t know it. I read several of her books in elementary and middle school, and aside from my father reading Lord of the Rings to me, Jones’ work was one of my first real introductions to fantasy. My library had The […]

The Cat was the Best Part

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This has not been a great year for me, bookwise. There haven’t been a whole lot of books I’ve connected with or really loved, and that has made it difficult to write these reviews. Most of my reviews can be summed up as, “It didn’t suck, but neither did it rock.” The Magicians of Caprona is in that category. It’s part of the Chrestomanci series, and I read and enjoyed the first one last month. The Chrestomanci series all take place in the same universe […]

Bad Priestess

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Half Cannonball! Charmed Life is the story of Eric Chant (called Cat) and his sister Gwendolen, who are orphaned in the first few pages of the book and eventually wind up living with a mysterious, peculiar man called Chrestomanci, who takes charge of their schooling as well. Gwendolen is a promising young witch, but Cat doesn’t seem to have any magical talent. OR DOES HE? Of course, we’ve seen this before, with a luckless British orphan who doesn’t seem to be anybody special, who gets […]



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