Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


Sometimes, a book cover promises cats and lies. This book, on the other hand, delivers in spades. SO many cats, guys.

Agnes Aubert's Mystical Cat Shelter by Heather Fawcett

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4.5 stars Nowhere Book Bingo 26: A book involving animals Monthly Keyword Challenge 26: Cat Official plot summary, because I finished this back in February, and my perimenopausal brain isn’t exactly helping here: Agnes Aubert leads a meticulously organized life, and she likes it that way. As the proudly type-A manager of a cat rescue charity, she has devoted her life to finding forever homes for stray cats. Now it’s the shelter that needs a new home. And the only landlord who will rent a […]

An Old Favorite

Howl's Moving Castle by Dianna Wynne Jones

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  I don’t know how many times I’ve read Howl’s Moving Castle. At least three, but probably more. If books were comfort food, this one would be creamy mac-n-cheese in a ceramic bowl on a cold winter’s day. It never gets old, it never gets dated. It is always exactly what it needs to be; which is a romping good time. For those who’ve not yet indulged in this delight, Howl’s Moving Castle follows Sophie, a young woman who inadvertently angers Ingary’s resident bad-witch and gets herself […]

“I’m going up to my room now, where I may die.”

Howl's Moving Castle (Howl's Moving Castle, #1) by Diana Wynne Jones

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**30 Books in 30 Days** Book 17/30 Most of the way through this, I couldn’t figure out why I had only rated it four stars on my first read (which was quite a while ago, in high school I think?). I was all, This is delightful! I love this! I’ve only ever had fond memories of it. And then I came to the ending, and I was like, Oh yeah, this is why. And then I also remembered Diana Wynne Jones book endings always tend […]

In which I review Howl’s Moving Castle

Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

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Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones is one of those books I read as a grown-up and wished I had discovered as a child. It stuck with me enough that when I saw that the Folio Society had produced a copy I needed to get it, and whilst I missed the first print (nobody took the Christmas present hinting I did…) I managed to get it on the reprint and so had a re-read of it this year. A lot of people will come […]

I hope your bacon burns.

Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

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This is a perfect little book. It’s a fantasy story that understands how perspective limits the ways in which stories can be told, in the very best of ways. It’s a lot like the movie (or more so the movie does a great job of translating the story to the screen) and the result is a beautifully visual novel with heart, intrigue, curiosity, and sense. The story begins in a fantasy kingdom and Sophie’s mother has decided to push her three daughters into apprenticeships. Sophie […]

I got to find my baby

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Howl’s Moving Castle is one of my favorite books ever, and I was over the moon when I found out Diana Wynne Jones had written a lesser-known sequel (or at least companion book.) As much as I enjoyed the way things came together at the end of the first book, I wanted more of Sophie’s fierceness and ability to cut through society’s nonsense, and I wanted more of Howl’s vanity and snark and never quite succeeding at being a truly terrible person. Unfortunately, Castle in […]



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