Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

I was kind of lost, too

Superman: Lost by Christopher Priest

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This was another Kareem Abdul-Jabbar pick and while I liked it, I did not find it as compelling as Famous Last Words. Superman: Lost is a graphic novel that involves time travel, PTSD, despair and hope. It is a commentary on our current political climate but also a reflection on our responsibility toward others and the duty to help those in danger, even when our help is unwanted. The story opens with Superman and the members of the Justice League going on a mission. Clark […]

‘Before my wife turned vegetarian, I’d always thought of her as completely unremarkable in every way’

The Vegetarian by Han Kang

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I visited Seoul in March for a flash holiday and on my way back, I stopped in a bookstore at Incheon airport. In their small English section, the only books they provided were English translations of books by South Korean authors or travel guides for the country. No Tim Cook biography, no Mitch Albom, no Dan Brown or whatever else you’d typically find in an airport bookshop. I found that so clever — restricting the English-language offerings to art created by South Koreans. This capitalistically […]

“In my shoes, a walking sleep / And my youth I pray to keep”

Heatstroke (2020) by Hazel Barkworth

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Heatstroke (2020) is clever–cleverer than its cover, certainly cleverer than its title. I remember that the review blurbs on the covers of Gillian Flynn’s Sharp Objects (2006) and Megan Abbott’s Dare Me (2012) signposted how terrifying teenaged girls can be–and this is certainly a thing, the way teenage girls are inscribed with contradictions of power and anxiety, and Heatstroke does deal with that–but I remember thinking, well, it’s actually the mother that is fairly fucking monstrous in Sharp Objects, and parental figures are pretty absent […]

The anger is palpable, but so is the sorrow

All My Rage: A Novel by Sabaa Tahir

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This YA novel was published in 2022 and won a National Book Award. It contains many difficult themes and triggers, including: racism, physical abuse, drug use/addiction/overdose, trauma, death and grief, The main characters/narrators in All My Rage are Noor, Salahudin and his mother Misbah. They live in a small desert community in Juniper California, near a military base that employs many in the town. Noor and Salahudin are high school seniors who have been friends since they were little, but when the story opens, near […]

A surprising and honest view of a courtesan’s life

A Woman of Pleasure: A Novel by Kiyoko Murata

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This novel was first published in Japan in 2013. The English translation by Juliet Winters Carpenter came out in 2024. A Woman of Pleasure is a novel based on real events that happened in Japan in 1903 when prostitutes organized for their rights. It is a fascinating novel that reveals the personal journey of its main character, Ichi, a 15-year-old girl recently sold into prostitution. But the novel also provides a lot of terribly interesting information about licensed prostitution and its place in Japanese society […]

“…a person can be more whole with broken parts.”

The Djinn Waits A Hundred Years: A Novel by Shubnum Khan

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  The Djinn Waits A Hundred Years is a ghost story, featuring a haunted house in Natal, South Africa. The house itself, called Akbar Manzil, has its own character and memories, and it is full of people who are likewise haunted by the ghosts of their pasts. This novel involves a love story set in the early 20th century as well as a coming of age story for 15-year old Sana Malek who has come with her father to live in Akbar Manzil 80+ years […]



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