Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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The Fifth Season: Funny how oppression is never the answer that the oppressors hope it is.

The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin

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A good friend gave me this book a few years ago as a very strong recommendation for the series. Intending to read it right away, I immediately purchased the rest of the trilogy. Then they sat on my shelf for a while. After reading Amina Al-Sirafi, I wanted to dig into Shannon Chakraborty’s trilogy. So, off I skipped to the local bookshop only to find that they had 1 and 3 in stock, but #2 would take a few weeks to arrive. Rather than be […]

Mostly Amusing, Sometimes Confusing

Sister Svangerd and the Not Quite Dead, The Loyal Opposition Trilogy Book 1 by K.J. Parker

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As a product of the Catholic school system from second grade through university, I have sat through A LOT of religion and theology classes. Heresies, schisms, saints, martyrs, whatever, I feel pretty well versed in church history. While KJ Parker’s Sister Svangerd and the Not Quite Dead is a fantasy novel, it leans hard into Christian church history and theology, setting up some good old fashioned good versus evil scenarios, but it’s not always clear who is good or evil. That’s intentional, but while Parker […]

Song of the Lioness: I will always love Alanna

Alanna: The First Adventure by Tamora Pierce

In the Hand of the Goddess by Tamora Pierce

The Woman Who Rides Like a Man by Tamora Pierce

Lioness Rampant by Tamora Pierce

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I began reading The Song of the Lioness quartet from Tamora Pierce’s Tortall series as bedtime reads after reading Lord of the Rings before bed in 2025. I’ve read them so many times before, so I know I can put them down and go to sleep whenever I feel drowsy. I have loved these books since I was in 7th grade – about 25 years – and I will always love them, but damn has it become clear how much I and the world have […]

This standalone fantasy goes incredibly hard.

The Poet Empress by Shen Tao

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Sending up the Bat Signal on this book, my first use of it this year. (FYI the last time I used it was with The Raven Scholar, my best book of 2025, so you know it’s serious.) I wouldn’t recommend this book as widely or as often as I have The Raven Scholar, but for a certain type of reader, this thing will hit hard. (As it hit me. Last night, crying softly on my couch as I opined to myself, IT’S SO BEAUTIFUL.) First […]

Not what I expected, but absolutely amazing

The Raven Scholar by Antonia Hodgson

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So at the end of last year, I decided that 2026 would be the year that I fully indulged my love for dark academia. I did some googling and put together a list of books that were considered part of the genre. Somewhere I came across The Raven Scholar and put it at the top of my list, as everyone seemed to love it. While reading it, I realized two things: 1) while there are a few dark academia elements, it’s not a book that I […]

A captivating tale based on a myth

Daughter of the Moon Goddess by Sue Lynn Tan

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Special thanks to NTE for gifting me this book in the last holiday book exchange! I had mentioned enjoying retold myths, and Daughter of the Moon Goddess is one of NTE’s favorite such stories. It is based on the Chinese myth of Chang’e, the Moon Goddess. This was a myth I was completely unfamiliar with, but I loved learning about this tale. Sue Lynn Tan takes the reader into a colorful, enchanting and dangerous world where immortals engage in subterfuge and violence to promote their […]



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