Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

“I may of use to you yet, my dear dragon”

Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

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4.5 stars CBR15 Bingo: History (set in an alternate history, in the Victorian era) 15-word review: Introverted lady scholar goes to fictional Iceland to research faeries, followed by her handsome colleague. Official book description (because I finished this at the start of May): Cambridge professor Emily Wilde is good at many things: She is the foremost expert on the study of faeries. She is a genius scholar and a meticulous researcher who is writing the world’s first encyclopaedia of faerie lore. But Emily Wilde is […]

Twitter Win Fizzles

This is How You Lost the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone

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Twitter was kind of saved from doom recently by a guy loudly and proudly promoting his favorite new book, and encouraging others to do the same. I approve of this behavior. I was with Bigolas Dickolas (a Monty Python reference, I hope) in his enthusiasm for about the first half of This is How You Lose the Time War, but then it lost me. The problem for me is that there is not enough world and character building to hold interest and keep the story […]

This book only has 480 ratings over on Goodreads, and I think it deserves more readers!

The House in the Orchard by Elizabeth Brooks

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I was actually given this book for free in my first Aardvark Book Club box, so it wasn’t one I was really interested in reading, but a free book is a free book, so I thought I’d give it a shot. And I liked it! It was a little bit messy in terms of pacing, and the blurb is pretty misleading, but I was so angry by the end of the book, I have to give it props, because it managed to get me invested […]

This is a perfect novel. #CBRBINGO – Scandal

The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes (The Queer Principles of Kit Webb, #2) by Cat Sebastian

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I originally said that I would have a review up later that same day I finished the book, after I stopped swooning, but the swooning never really stopped, and then I got anxious about trying to make this review live up to how much I loved the book, and then I just gave up and said I’d get to it later. Fast forward two months, let’s just get something out there so we can all move on with our lives. The short version of this […]

“Perhaps the compulsion to fill every inch of space was because it made him feel less alone.”

The Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley

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This was a perfectly fine book. I do not regret reading it. Ringing endorsement! It also isn’t really to my tastes anymore (though I think the me of ten plus years ago would have loved it). It feels too pat and constructed, not ‘optimistic,’ that’s not the right word . . . I don’t know how to explain it. Just saying it’s not to my taste really anymore seems easier than trying to figure it out. The premise is pretty high concept. A former artist […]

How does one describe this book?

Freedom & Necessity by Steven Brust & Emma Bull

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I’m having the hardest time writing this review, but I just need to suck it up and word vomit out something, because I read this back in March. The problem is, I have no idea how to describe this strange, strange book. And also, not sure how I feel about it? Like, I enjoyed it? I gave it four stars (well, 3.5)? But I also still find it confounding. By the way, Steven Brust and Emma Bull teaming up to write this somehow led me […]



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