Cannonball Read 11

Sticking it to Cancer One Book at a Time

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Bee Respectful, Bee Kind

Jacob's Room to Choose by Sarah Hoffman, Ian Hoffman

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Towards the end of library time, Mrs. Reeves asks the class if anyone needs to go to the bathroom before they head back to class. Jacob and Sophie raise their hands. The next page shows Jacob, wearing a dress, standing in front of a door with a pictograph of a person wearing pants. Sophie, wearing pants, is standing in front of a pictograph of a person wearing a dress. They stopped outside of the bathroom doors. “Do you think it’s okay?” asked Sophie. “I don’t know” said Jacob. Dear readers, it was not okay. Jacob saw two boys washing their […]

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Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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8/15/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:57 |

A Snarky but Serious Look at Pop Culture

Bad Feminist by Roxane Gay

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Bingo 7 (The Collection) for the diagonal L to R, top to bottom BINGO! I have had Bad Feminist on my physical TBR shelf for some time. I was motivated to read it for the Bingo square, but also because I’m writing a course syllabus for this fall in which I am considering including a section from Bad Feminist. I figure, if I’m going to teach it, I should know the whole thing for context. I have heard a lot about Roxane Gay as a writer, have seen her in the news a time or two, and I follow her […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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7/27/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:56 |

How gender screws with all of us

The Gender Games: the problem with men and women, from someone who has been both by Juno Dawson

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Part memoir and part introduction to gender and trans issues, Dawson, a trans woman, strikes a balance between her personal experience with gender, both pre- and post-transition, and a wider discussion of how gender messes with all of us. Her main argument is that gender is a ridiculously narrow set of expectations that hurts everyone: cis and trans, binary and non, female and male, from before we are even born. As someone with only a surface understanding of gender theory, I liked how clearly she set out the difference between sex and gender; sex being the physical, chemical, biological and […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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2/11/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:1 |

I taught you better than to open doors you can’t close

An Unkindness of Ghosts by Rivers Solomon

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Rivers Solomon’s An Unkindness of Ghosts is yet another great example of the kind of book I would have missed had I not started reading more speculative fiction and diversifying the voices in my library. That would have been a pity, because this complex, powerful novel may very well end up at the top of my 2019 favorites list. After Earth suffered an unnamed cataclysm 300 years ago, the remnants of humanity were crowded onto the spaceship Matilda and launched toward some long-forgotten destination. Humanity being what it is, the ship ends up segregated by race and privilege, with white […]

Help Support Cannonball Read

Buy the following on Amazon and help our mission to stick it to cancer, one book at a time:

We pay for our website first, and then all proceeds above and beyond those fees are donated to the American Cancer Society in AlabamaPink's name. Find out how else you can help support our mission.

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1/20/2019 | 's CBR11 Review No:3 |

We need books like this…..

You Don't Know Everything, Jilly P! by Alex Gino

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This is my Underrepresented category. You know of a minority, it is here. There are two dads in the doctor’s office. Jilly’s aunts are gay, and one is black (with two children from her previous marriage that she “called the biggest mistake of her life”). Gino speaks about the injustices surrounding the shootings of young black people. There is a black and deaf child. Jilly’s baby sister is deaf. The author, Alex Gino is non-gender conforming. You Don’t Know Everything, Jilly P!  is Gino’s sophomore novel. Their first novel, George, has gotten a lot of praise and slack for talking […]

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9/11/2018 's CBR10 Review No:350 |

Teddy’s Favorite Toy might be a Surprise

Teddy’s Favorite Toy by Christian Trimmer

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Teddy’s Favorite Toy by Christian Trimmer has one of my favorite things about a book: It did not get preachy over the fact that Teddy’s favorite toy is a doll (which is a cross between the Rugrat doll and Barbie). Nobody teases him. Nobody mentioned he is a boy. The story is: Teddy’s favorite toy is tossed out and how a real superhero finds it. Teddy has toys that are more traditionally considered “boy” toys and he has this traditionally considered “girl” toy. He has toys that anyone could have. There is no mention of “boy” or “girl” toys. It […]

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6/11/2018 's CBR10 Review No:199 |

Evolutionary Biology is on notice

Testosterone Rex: Myths of Sex, Science, and Society by Cordelia Fine

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3.5 stars I like Cordelia Fine and her work. Part of that, I’m willing to admit, may be confirmation bias — she clearly identifies herself as a feminist and is very upfront that her work is reflective of that viewpoint. But I was also trained as a scientist, and from that perspective my position is that many of her critics and detractors (and I’ll note here that for brevity’s sake I’m not including in this category people who have fundamentally sexist views and who probably simply cannot be reached) have crucially misunderstood the overarching theme of Fine’s research. Testosterone Rex […]

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2/21/2018 's CBR10 Review No:11 |

9/11 Revisited.

The Terror Dream by Susan Faludi

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The Terror Dream by Susan Faludi It’s been something like, oh, I don’t know, 5 or 6 weeks since I posted any reviews here. I’m 30 reviews behind and TOTALLY NOT PANICKING AT ALL. I taught a summer class, and then I added another part-time teaching gig on top of the primary and online gigs that I have, so exhaustion is high and time is low. I’m going to try to catch up over the weekend, but if you really want real-time updates, follow me on the Goodreads. I’m a much more active reader, and I’m *full* of shade. So. […]

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8/26/2016 's CBR8 Review No:87 |


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