Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


The stories we tell ourselves

Conversations with Friends by Sally Rooney

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Conversations with Friends has earned the (dubious) honor of receiving my first 5-star review of the year. For the first 3-4 chapters in the book, I didn’t think it would, but it ended up being a compulsive read that kept popping up in my mind when I was doing other things. Conversations is a tight story about a young student, Frances, and her best friend (and ex-girlfriend) Bobbi, who meet and befriend Melissa, a journalist married to a handsome actor, Nick. As Frances is drawn into Melissa […]

Lower animal content, higher angst for this sequel

Best Laid Plans by Roan Parrish

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I was intensely curious about Jack’s brother Charlie after reading Better Than People, so I was very pleased to see that this book would be about him. Alas, the animal content of this book isn’t quite as high as the previous one in the series – only two cats. But gosh, Jane and Marmot are pretty amazing cats. When Rye inherits a house from a grandfather he never met, it seems too good to be true. But given he’s been couchsurfing in Seattle, he makes […]

These murder club meetings are becoming a regular thing. We need a new name, though.

One of Us is Lying by Karen M. McManus

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The Breakfast Club meets Pretty Little Liars, One of Us Is Lying is the story of what happens when five strangers walk into detention and only four walk out alive. Everyone is a suspect, and everyone has something to hide. The five students who land in detention for breaking the “no cellphone” rule are: Bronwyn, the brain, is Yale-bound and never breaks a rule. Addy, the beauty, is the picture-perfect homecoming princess. Nate, the criminal, is already on probation for dealing. Cooper, the athlete, is the all-star baseball pitcher. And Simon, the outcast, is the creator of […]

Looking for a great debut fiction novel? Look no further! (Belated Bingo – Book Club)

If I Had Your Face by Frances Cha

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Well hello there. I am well beyond in my reading goal AND with my reviews AND missed my chance to bingo (insert dramatic sigh). But I’m going to keep on truckin’ for my own personal benefit with my bingo board (because it’s fun!) and will chalk it up to the nightmare that is 2020 collateral damage. ONWARD! (I’m not tagging the reviews, just including what my Belated Bingo category was in the title). This book is in the Book Club category for me because a […]

I still don’t really know how I feel about this book. #CBRBingo – Red

Me Before You (Me Before You, #1) by Jojo Moyes

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This is one of those books that has the weight of expectations before you even pick it up. I bought it, actually at a Rainbow Rowell reading, right before the movie came out and everyone was talking about it all the time. Then my sister completely spoiled me for the plot (I asked her to; she wasn’t being a dick), and it sounded like something that would make me angry, so I just never got around to it. Flash forward to this year when the […]

soft-core misery porn

Turbulence by David Szalay

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An older woman is on a plane. She and her seatmate are strangers. There is a bout of – wait for it – turbulence, that inserts her into her seatmate’s life. So it begins; a series of lives briefly touching lives from one story to the next. I’m sure that I was meant to feel something while reading this; something was supposed to catch my breath, quicken my heart rate- it was supposed to hit emotionally. Really, I just felt Szalay going through the motions. […]



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