Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


Join the CBR18 Book Bingo Reading Challenge—Now Underway!   

Anything but plain

Plain Jane and the Mermaid by Vera Brosgol

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cbr16bingo Liberate: (Jane tries to liberate herself from the bonds of being a woman; the mermaids try to liberate themselves from ageing) Plain Jane and the Mermaid by Vera Brosgol was on my radar for some time, but I never found a copy and reading time at the same time. I’m not sure what I expected, or honestly to like it as much as I did. I thought it would be cute, funny, not WOW but also not mediocre. And while there are no real surprises […]

Beautiful, harrowing and oh so sad

In Memoriam by Alice Winn

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CBR16 Bingo: Liberate (our protagonists are fighting in World War I to keep the world safe from the Germans) Official plot summary, because I finished this book in early April: It’s 1914, and talk of war feels far away to Henry Gaunt, Sidney Ellwood and the rest of their classmates, safely ensconced in their idyllic boarding school in the English countryside. At seventeen, they’re too young to enlist, and anyway, Gaunt is fighting his own private battle – an all-consuming infatuation with his best friend, […]

Two Reviews for Category Part Two

Meesh the Bad Demon #2: The Secret of the Fang: (A Graphic Novel) by Michelle Lam

City of Dragons V02 Rise of the Shadowfire: A Graphic Novel by Jaimal Yogis

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Obviously Meesh the Bad Demon #2: The Secret of the Fang: (A Graphic Novel) by Michelle Lam is cbr16bingo Part Two because it says it is a Book Two in the title!  As is City of Dragons V02 Rise of the Shadowfire: A Graphic Novel. However, while I enjoyed both sequels, I was not as “into it” as book one. Still I like both and recommend them for the younger crowd, though there is some “spooky” to both, and especially in book one City of […]

Roll the dice, save the world

Just Roll with It by Veronica Agarwal

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cbr16bingo  Games (Maggie plays a D&D-like game that starts to bleed into her real world) Just Roll with It by Veronica Agarwal and Lee Durfey-Lavoie is a sweet story about dealing with OCD. This time the parents are a bit more “clueful” but also still have microaggressions that cause issues with the child, Maggie, who is OCD. And it is Maggie who is the one saying there is no problem, that they are not stupid, and are afraid of the stigma attached to “mental health” or […]

Why does this category sound like a cooking term?

Emmie and Friends V08 Always Anthony by Terri Libenson

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cbr16bingo Détante  Or at least how I understand the word. Perhaps the “tension” is not earth shattering in a world wide way, or even nationally, but it is shattering to the person who is dealing with it: Bullies. Not only did one of our main characters deal with bullying, a younger student is also facing it. But it’s not just some “faceless” jerk, but friends/teammates of Anthnoy. And if he “rocks the boat” then it will not be good for him. Therefore there is the tension […]

If it has a sequel I’ll read it

Heebie Jeebies by Matthew Erman

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 cbr16bingo  Bananas  I could have picked disco as there is a disco dancing math teacher, but I picked Bananas just because the whole thing is nuts. It is Humor 101. This should have ice cream and nuts and cherry on top. It is funny, it is sweet, it is not fattening, and you might even lose a few pounds laughing your buns off!  Heebie Jeebies by Matthew Erman and illustrated by Shelby Criswell is not my OMG favorite ever book, and is more of a […]



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