Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Around the World Around the World

Night Prayers by Santiago Gamboa

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Very mixed feelings on Night Prayers. Ultimately, it’s one of the best things I’ve read in 2025. It’s also one of the more frustrating. Gamboa writes in the style of his Latin American contemporaries such as Bolaño and Marquez. And for the most part, he does it well. This is a style I always enjoy sampling, even if it can frustrate me at times with its tangents and magic realism. I quit the book several times in the beginning but was inexorably drawn back to it and […]

The battle for home

Amazona by Canizales

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Have you read a book and thought, “Well. Now what about that?” You are not sure what you are feeling about it. Oh, you know it is not a “I disliked this,” but is it a “I liked it” read? Amazona was like that for me.  Canizales story (translated by Sofia Huitron Martinez)  is a multiple layered story about how Columbia’s actions against their native population and the land affect everyone; and not just in their country, but worldwide. There were several bumps for me […]

July 2022 Leftovers

The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware

From Crook to Cook: Platinum Recipies from Tha Boss Dogg's Kitchen by Snoop Dogg

Brighton Rock by Graham Greene

Plunder of the Sun by David Dodge

Stunt: A Mythical Reimagining of Nellie Jackson, Madame of Natchez by Saida Agostini

The Last Pirate of New York: A Ghost Ship, A Killer, and the Birth of a Gangster Nation by Rich Cohen

The Guest List by Lucy Foley

Defender of the Innocent: The Casebook Files of Martin Ehrengraf by Lawrence Block

Voluntary Madness by Vicki Hendricks

Two Gentlemen of Lebowski: A Most Excellent Comedie and Tragic Romance by Adam Bertocci

The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor by Gabriel García Márquez

A Night to Remember by Walter Lord

Slonim Woods 9: A Memoir by Daniel Barban Levin

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman

My Summer Darlings by May Cobb

The Cat Who Saved Books by Sōsuke Natsukawa

Firestarter by Stephen King

The Editor by Steven Rowley

Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson

Crossroad Blues by Ace Atkins

Lucky by Jackie Collins

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Here are reviews for the books I read in July that I didn’t have time or energy to do a full review on. Note: I was out of work in July so I read a lot. The Woman in Cabin 10 *** Read this while on a cruise ship and it definitely gave me some interesting feelings! A relatively entertaining thriller. I’d read another Ruth Ware book but wouldn’t rush out to do so From Crook to Cook: Platinum Recipes From Tha Boss Dogg’s Kitchen**** […]

Soldier For Fortune

Gangsters of Capitalism: Smedley Butler and the Making and Breaking of the American Empire by Jonathan M. Katz

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An excellent read and an infuriating read. Worth all five stars. And like Du Bois’ Black Reconstruction and Ackerman’s Reign of Terror, you’re guaranteed to be peeved on every page. I knew the United States had a colonizing history dating back, well really to its foundation through the US-Mexican War of the 1840s, but more specifically from the end of the 19th century onwards. I knew that we captured many islands in the Caribbean and Pacific respectively, even if I didn’t know the hows-and-whys. Jonathan M. Katz does […]

Extra Reading March 2022

Batman: The Killing Joke by Christa Faust and Gary Phillips

The Big East: Inside the Most Entertaining and Influential Conference in College Basketball History by Dana O'Neil

In The Country We Love: My Family Divided by Diane Guerrero

The Banks by Roxane Gay, Ming Doyle (Illustrator)

One Night, New York by Lara Thompson

The Secret Lives of Married Women by Elissa Wald

Lost and Found in Harlem by Delia C. Pitts

Beautiful Little Fools by Jillian Cantor

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

Scandal in Babylon by Barbara Hambly

Sadie by Courtney Summers

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These are the books I finished in the month of March in which I didn’t have time or words to elaborate on… Batman: The Killing Joke *** Two of my favorites team up for a Batman prose novel? Yes! But the end result is just okay. Interestingly enough, I think both writers do a better job with the random Gothamites than they do with the Caped Crusader and his primary nemesis. You’re fine just reading Alan Moore’s legendary graphic novel. The Big East: Inside the […]

In A Foreign Field

Missionaries by Phil Klay

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I usually enjoy former President Barack Obama’s recommended reading lists but, after reading Missionaries, I confess that its presence on his list kind of bugs me. This book is, among other things, a strong handed critique of borderless imperial war and I think it takes a certain kind of cynicism to set that aside and appreciate it solely on its literary value. Because, damn, this book is cynical. How could it not be? Frankly, I knew little about Colombia until reading it. I knew Simón Bolivar liberated it […]



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