Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

The Twenty-Six Year Old Virgin

Losing It by Emma Rathbone

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I’m a sucker for coming of age stories, and I’ve read and watched a lot of them, but the premise for this one brings an unexpected combination of things: A woman in her mid-twenties, formerly a collegiate swimmer, can’t figure out her life so she moves to SEC-country to live with a plate-painting aunt and to lose her virginity. It goes ok. The protagonist is Julia Greenfield, the kind of character that might live in Stars Hollow or the dorm in Undeclared. She’s drifting through […]

I would probably have liked this better if the protagonist was the sister

The Book of Speculation by Erika Swyler

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Official book description: Simon Watson, a young librarian, lives alone in a house that is slowly crumbling toward the Long Island Sound. His parents are long dead. His mother, a circus mermaid who made her living by holding her breath, drowned in the very water his house overlooks. His younger sister, Enola, ran off six years ago and now reads tarot cards for a traveling carnival. One June day, an old book arrives on Simon’s doorstep, sent by an antiquarian bookseller who purchased it on […]

I’m losing my mind

The Memory Book by Lara Avery

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Official book description: “They tell me that my memory will never be the same, that I’ll start forgetting things. At first just a little, and then a lot. So I’m writing to remember.” Sammie McCoy is a girl with a plan: graduate at the top of her class and get out of her small town as soon as possible. Nothing will stand in her way–not even the rare genetic disorder the doctors say will slowly steal her memories and then her health. So the memory […]

A bit like “About a Boy”, except here the Hugh Grant character is a heroin addict

Sangen om en brukket nese (The Ballad of a Broken Nose) by Arne Svingen

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4.5 stars Bart is about to turn thirteen. He’s named after Bart Simpson, because it seems his mother wanted him to be tough and clever and able to handle himself. This is also why she’s signed him up for boxing lessons. He dutifully  goes to practise several times a week, and one of these days, he may actually start hitting. His boxing coach suggests he may want to try out for some other sport, which Bart can understand, as except for having a pretty good […]

“Heartbreak is a loss. Divorce is a piece of paper.”

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

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Earlier this year, Taylor Jenkins Reid published Daisy Jones and the Six, which has generally been very well received critically and keeps popping up on “Must read” lists. In several review of that book, I saw this, Jenkins Reid’s previous release, from 2017, highly recommended. Several people who were so-so on Daisy Jones and the Six claimed to prefer The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, and as movie stars seemed more intriguing to me than rock stars, I decided to give it a try. There are multiple narratives in […]

Would have liked there to be a stronger romance element

The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman

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4.5 stars From Goodreads, because it’s been over a month since I finished this: The only child of a single mother, Nina has her life just as she wants it: a job in a bookstore, a kick-butt trivia team, a world-class planner and a cat named Phil. If she sometimes suspects there might be more to life than reading, she just shrugs and picks up a new book. When the father Nina never knew existed suddenly dies, leaving behind innumerable sisters, brothers, nieces, and nephews, […]



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