Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


Two girls, couple mysteries and basketball.

Shirley and Jamila Save Their Summer by Gillian Goerz

Shirley and Jamila's Big Fall by Gillian Goerz

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When ten-year-olds Shirley and (new girl) Jamila meet accidentally at a local tag sale, their summer takes an interesting turn, one that neither expected it to take. They not only find a way to not go to the summer camps their mothers have signed them up for and find a bit of freedom, they also solve a case of stolen property and a missing gecko, not to mention they become friends. All of this and a bit more happens in Shirley and Jamila Save Their […]

When the clock doesn’t tick

Hourglass by Barbara Mazzi

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Twenty is just a cog in the wheel of the utopian society in Hourglass by Barbara Mazzi. Or at least for  the privileged.  Twenty is trying for one of the coveted positions on the team of engineers. If you make it to the top the reward is everything. But until then, they help keep the Hour Glass running so the privileged few can reap the reward of immortality. But when a real piece of the machine goes missing, more than the Hour Glass will fall […]

Let’s take this to the neck level

The Confessional by Paige Hender

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Recently I entered a “Grab a Galley” sweepstakes thingie and I have been honored to win a few that I really wanted. But one of them I was on the fence about putting my name in for. This was The Confessional by Paige Hender. But (and I know one shouldn’t judge a book by its cover) the cover was calling me. Which might not be a good thing since it is about vampires. Picture it: New Orleans, 1922. Cora Velasquez is a fairly newly turned […]

What kind of pastry are you?

The Teller of Small Fortunes by Julie Leong

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It’s cold outside my friends. Let’s snuggle up under the covers with a cup of something warm and this lovely cozy fantasy. I think I’d be a simple chocolate brownie, super sweet and delightfully squishy. Tao is a traveling fortune teller, drifting from village to village in a wagon pulled by her trusty mule Laohu. It’s a solitary life made less lonely when a small fortune causes a former thief and an ex-mercenary to join her in her travels as they search for a lost […]

Magic!!! (jazz hands)

Pacheco and the Witch of the Mountain: A Graphic Novel by Juan E. Zambrano

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We have seen this story before: Boys cannot do magic. They cannot be witches. The non witches also think witches are evil and bad. Witches think non witches are beneath them and if they have any trace of magic it is not pure and therefore not worthy of paying attention to.  But in Pacheco and the Witch of the Mountain: A Graphic Novel by Juan E. Zambrano (due June 2025) this story is told with a bit of fun and humor, plus a few twists […]

Ghosts and Halloween are nothing to fear, but what about another holiday cheer?

The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt by Riel Nason and Byron Eggenschwiler

The Little Ghost Quilt's Winter Surprise by Riel Nason and Byron Eggenschwiler

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In 2020 The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt was published. And according to its publisher description, it became an instant Halloween classic. In July 2025 a new gift edition will be published. I am not sure how this differs from the original as I read this as an online reader copy. But regardless of the extras it might have, it will still be the same sweet book about being yourself and the adventures you will have because of it.  The story is sweet and […]



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