Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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He paints like birds sing

My Friends by Fredrik Backman

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This was actually my first Fredrik Backman but quite a few fellow Cannonballers mentioned this novel during one of the Zoom meet ups so I decided it was time to give him a shot (and then got distracted by other books). The story explores two timelines, 25 years apart. The present or later timeline (it’s a bit vague on specifics that would tie either timeline to a specific decade so when I say present, that’s just for simplicity) focuses on Louisa, a teen in foster […]

A Inconsistent Reading Experience

Anxious People by Fredrik Backman

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If you plotted my enjoyment of this book over time, it would resemble a V shape. I really liked the beginning. I love Backman’s humor and I was interested in the setup of the book. However, the characters were both unlikable and zany, and by about 35-40%, that combination was starting to get a little too repetitive. But then the characters started to become more fleshed out, more human, less like caricatures, and I started to like the book again. Some (not all) of the […]

”He still doesn’t know who he’s most scared of: the hooligans with tattoos or the hooligans with ties and suits.”

Us Against You: A Novel by Fredrik Backman

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Cbr17bingo Play (hockey) bingo Us Against You is the second novel in Backman’s Beartown trilogy, something I didn’t realize until I was well into the novel. I haven’t read book 1, Beartown, but as it turns out, it doesn’t matter much. Anything important from that story is more or less explained in the course of this one. The trilogy is about the people of Beartown, a small remote town in Sweden, where hockey is more than just a game. It is the heart of the […]

I warmed to this novel, but it took awhile

Anxious People by Fredrik Backman

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CBR 17 BINGO: Family, because family relationships (police officers Jim & Jack; Anna-Lena and Roger; Ro and Julia; the bank robber and the robber’s children) are motivating factors for the characters Back in 2017, I was, like everyone else, charmed by A Man Called Ove, so when I saw another novel by Fredrik Backman in a Little Free Library, I snapped it up. It started strong when, on the first page, I smiled at this paragraph, “This story is about a lot of things, but […]

“Art is what we leave of ourselves in other people”

My Friends by Fredrik Backman

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Bingo: I’m using this book for the “Arts” Bingo space, since the book centers on multiple characters who are artists and on the definition of art itself. I should really know better, at this point. I should know that if a book has Fredrik Backman’s name on the cover, it will break my heart. But I let myself be tricked by the cover art of carefree swimmers, and went into it expecting a light beach read. While the story did involve beaches, it was not […]

The Scholomance Trilogy (and a Short Story)

A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik

The Last Graduate by Naomi Novik

The Golden Enclaves by Naomi Novik

The Answer Is No by Fredrik Backman

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What would you do if you were basically in a dark version of Hogwarts, where the semi-sentient school barely cares if you live, and you can’t leave for 4 years? If you’re El, short for Galadriel, you spend the first 2. 5 years of that letting your prickly, angry, bitter exterior prevent anyone from getting close to you. This is where A Deadly Education starts off, about halfway through El’s junior year at the Scholomance. We find out over the course of the novel why […]



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