Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


Join the CBR18 Book Bingo Reading Challenge—Now Underway!   

Dark Fairy Tale Vibes

The Girl in the Tower by Katherine Arden

The Winter of the Witch by Katherine Arden

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CBR18 BINGO: Justice for systemic oppression of women in The Girl in the Tower and Bird for The Winter of the Witch (firebird on the cover, firebird character in the book) I feel like this should go without saying, but each review may contain spoilers for the book(s) that came before. The Girl in the Tower This picks up very shortly after the first book ends, and we’re back to some politicking in Moscow. Meanwhile, Vasya has disguised herself as a boy because it’s dangerous to travel as a woman, and is […]

I Thought There’d be More Unicorn.

The Unicorn Hunters by Katherine Arden

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Arden has returned to mixing historical fiction with fantasy again. This time insead of medieval Russia, Arden is taking inspiration from the life of the last heiress of Brittany—before France married her off to force a union between the two crowns. The historical Anne of Brittany didn’t exactly have the happiest of lives, but maybe in retelling, things may go differently? The first half of the book did an excellent job pulling me in: Anne is in a precarious position; she knows France is trying to […]

Slow Start, Then Great

The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden

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CBR18 BINGO: Left (left side of my bookshelf) This wasn’t quite what I was expecting. The first chunk of the book had more politicking than I expected from reading the book blurb, as well as multiple POVs. While I don’t mind political fantasies, I was in the mood for a story about Vasya’s life in her village and the trouble brewing there. We did eventually get to that, and then I was hooked. There were still multiple POVs, but I think mostly the perspectives were from […]

I loved this book.

The Unicorn Hunters by Katherine Arden

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Katherine Arden’s Bear and the Nightingale trilogy is one of my favorite reads of the last few years, and maybe of all time, so I was delighted when I learned that she just released a new book, The Unicorn Hunters, and that it was available for purchase immediately! I did, in fact, purchase it immediately. This is a fictionalization/fantasy-ization of the tale of Anne of Brittany. Anne is a sovereign duchess and Brittany is independent; unfortunately, France really wants Brittany. King Charles (well, actually, the […]

“Armageddon was a fire in the harbor, a box delivered on a cold day. It wasn’t one great tragedy, but ten million tiny ones, and everyone faced theirs alone.”

The Warm Hands of Ghosts: A Novel by Katherine Arden

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They are fighting their war in the last world, but we’re dying in this one. January 1918. Laura Iven, a revered field nurse, wounded when the Germans bombed the munitions depot her field hospital was next to, is discharged from the medical corps, leaving behind a brother still fighting in Flanders. Months later, back home in Halifax, Canada, Laura lives assisting three elderly mediums after the deaths of her parents. On the night that Pim Shaw, a young widow seeking to connect with her son, […]

Empty Smiles

Empty Smiles by Katherine Arden

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Sorry but this was just a solid 3 stars. I think the biggest issue is that Arden tried to rewrite The Smiling Man and based on the first book in the quartet it never squared. We also didn’t get a lot of time with our trio of Ollie, Coco, and Brian together. The ending also just felt very rushed. Finally, the whole book was pretty short. I got to the 80 something mark and the remaining part of the book was excerpts from the first […]



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