Cannonball Read 17

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Ian Flemming Goes Cozy and Slightly Comedic

Starter Villain by John Scalzi

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I don’t know how John Scalzi would feel about his work being labeled “cozy” but that’s basically what Starter Villain is, a cozy adventure riffing in Scalzi fashion this time on the James Bond spy thriller. If you’ve read any of Scalzi’s more recent work, especially The Kaiju Preservation Society, Starter Villain will be kind of familiar. Take a down on his luck smarter than he might initially appear regular person, a former journalist now substitute teacher named Charlie, and throw him into an improbably […]

It’s not classified so read about a spy!

Spy School the Graphic Novel by Stuart Gibbs

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Spy School the Graphic Novel is based from the Stuart Gibbs series of the same name. This is a modern take on the super spy but with all the classic elements. James Bond might have been smoother, but never as funny. Not having read the novels, I am not sure how they compare, but either graphic novel would be good for ages 10 and up. We follow a kid who is recruited for a special CIA run spy-creating school. Only he thinks it is a […]

It’s not the years, its the mileage.

The True Adventures of the World's Greatest Stuntman by Vic Armstrong with Robert Sellers

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You may not know his face but you know his characters. In his extraordinary career, Vic Armstrong has been Superman (doubling for the late Christopher Reeve), Indiana Jones (doubling for Harrison Ford in the original trilogy), and James Bond (doubling for George Lazenby, Roger Moore, and Sean Connery [Never Say Never Again]) among a host of others. When a stunt is too outrageous, or dangerous, for the star the stunt person steps in to get the job done. The True Adventures of the World’s Greatest […]

From Jamaica with Crocodiles

The 007 Diaries: Filming Live and Let Die by Roger Moore

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As part of his contract when taking over the role of James Bond from Sean Connery (and George Lazenby), Roger Moore was asked to keep a diary of the experience filming his first Bond picture, Live and Let Die. Based on the novel by Ian Fleming, the story finds Bond trying to take down a ruthless heroin smuggler named Mr. Big, played by Yaphet Kotto. Jane Seymour is the love interest, Solitaire, and the movie has a number of stunts that rank it among the […]

Fun with Family Secrets

Spy x Family vol 4 by Tatsuya Endo

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So far in Spy X Family, the Forger family consists of dad Loid (real identity: master spy Twilight), mom Yor (real identity master assassin Thorn Princess), and daughter Anya (a telepath). None of them knows the others’ secrets, except for Anya, except that she’s about 6 and thus misunderstands a lot of what she catches her adoptive parents thinking. Loid and Yor marry sort of out of convenience; he needs a family for a mission (she doesn’t know that) and she needs a family to […]

Bond…Anachronism Bond

Ian Fleming's James Bond in VARGR by Warren Ellis, Jason Masters

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My local library allows us to roam the shelves in thirty-minute increments, in limited numbers. It was recently my turn. For the first time in over a year I was able to take my time browsing the graphic novel collections (we have one in the general fiction section and one for teens). To my surprise, the library had acquired several new-to-me  selections. The first one I grade was James Bond in VARGR. I’m a Bond fan and also a fan of spy comics; some of […]



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