Cannonball Read 11

Sticking it to Cancer One Book at a Time

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Act One: Scene One: You the Reader Reading this Book

Positively Izzy by Terri Libenson

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While staring Positively Izzy by Terri Libenson, I was thinking it was like every Raina Telgemeier graphic novel out there. Which is not a bad thing, but since I have read all the original graphic novels of Telgemeier, I was not really digging Izzy. However, by the end there is enough differences that you are not just rereading Telgemeier. The story pans out differently even though the characters are still similar but then again, practically any story you could pick up about middle schoolers today would have similar characters. The flashing between two storylines, at first, can be a little […]

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10/25/2018 's CBR10 Review No:395 |

The play’s the thing

Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood

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CBR10Bingo: This Old Thing (The Tempest) and Birthday (Hag-Seed) I’m a big fan of Margaret Atwood’s novels. I haven’t read everything she’s written, but I have a shelf full of her books and have loved all but one (sorry, The Heart Goes Last). I always watch for her new releases, and she’s one of the rare exceptions I’ll make to buy hardcover. When Hag-Seed came out a few years ago, I was all excited and ready to buy, until I looked at the cover blurb and saw that it was a modern re-telling of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, a play that […]

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9/8/2018 's CBR10 Review No:51 |

A warm and lovely book that took me by surprise

Anybody out there? by Marian Keyes

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Anna is living with her family in Ireland, recouperating after an accident. Everybody is taking great care of her, but she can’t shake the feeling that people are tip-toeing around her. And she can’t seem to reach Aidan, who is still in New York. As soon as she’s healed she decides she must go back to her old apartment, her job as a PR for a beauty brand, her old life.   Anybody out there is written in a light, breezy language with a likable main character. Anna is strong, she is flawed and she is deeply entrenched in her […]

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7/14/2018 's CBR10 Review No:21 |

*Not ALL Americans*

The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult

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I hate Americans. I hate the way they think they are (or ought to be) the greatest country in the world. I hate that they define Trump as the leader of the free world and I hate their self-righteousness as liberators of oppressed countries. Which is why I hate The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult. We start off with the blandest of bland protagonist, cookie-cutter pretty girl with a scar and a shameful past. She’s also a baker, because she wants to bake all night to hide herself away from the world (never mind that most bakers starts at four in […]

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7/3/2018 's CBR10 Review No:19 |

Faerie court intrigue at its finest

The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

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Of course I want to be like them. They’re beautiful as blades forged in some divine fire. They will live forever. This book by Holly Black is the first in a new YA series, The Folk of the Air, set in the treacherous High Court of Faerie.  I haven’t read anything by Ms Black previously, but I’ve been in a reading slump for a few months and this book looked promising when I saw it in the hot titles section at the library.  The first chapter jumps right into action, and I was hooked immediately into the storyline. Jude and […]

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6/26/2018 's CBR10 Review No:21 |

51: An intriguing play that riffs off Plato’s cave allegory

The Shadow of the Hummingbird by Athol Fugard

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I’m developing a “new global literature” online course, which means lots of lovely reading! For each of the literature courses I have developed, I like to implement a variety of genres. Further, since this is global literature, I need to think about several nations or regions being represented that are not European or Western in focus. Finally, since this is “new” global literature, I decided that everything needed to be published after 9/11, as a starting point to thinking about how globalization changed. This is all a very long preamble to my review, but that’s the reason I read a […]

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6/19/2018 's CBR10 Review No:51 |

Even when it’s about the women, it’s about the men.

Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann

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Valley of the dolls is about three women and their path into and along stardom. Anne is a frigid woman from New Jersey who moves to New York and gets a job for a theatre-lawyer-guy. She gets proposed to immediately by a wealthy guy, but turns him down for an Englishman with glorious hair. He, in turn, dumps her because he’s an artist, and then Anne becomes a famous model for a make-up brand. Anne meets Neely O’Hara, back when they’re still poor. Neely can sing and Anne uses her job with the lawyer-guy to get Neely a part in […]

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5/26/2018 's CBR10 Review No:14 |

A showgirl’s life

All the Beautiful Girls by Elizabeth J. Church

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This is a book that may not be for everyone – there are issues of child sexual abuse, self mutilation, drug addiction and some domestic abuse.  In saying that, it’s also a well written, powerful story of a young woman who has to battle her demons and come out of it into a better place.  It’s also a story that has strong female friendship among the glitz and glamour of old Las Vegas in the 1960s, which Ms Church portrays very well. It begins with eight year old Lily Decker finding herself as an orphan after a car crash kills […]

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5/3/2018 's CBR10 Review No:20 |


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