Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


“Isn’t it better to have your heart broken than to have it wither up? Before it could be broken it must have felt something splendid. That would be worth the pain.”

The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

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Valency has always lived a dull and restrained life under the thumb of her family, but decides to start living how she likes when she learns she has only a year to live. I knew the plot twist of this book before I got into it, though I’m not sure how – maybe the plagiarism controversy of Colleen McCullough‘s The Ladies of Missalonghi? Anyway, luckily it didn’t really affect my enjoyment. This book has all the hallmarks of an LM Montgomery book – the rich […]

“The greatest happiness…is to sneeze when you want to.”

The Blue Castle by Lucy Maud Montgomery

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Rebellion flared up in her soul as the dark hours passed by — not because she had no future but because she had no past. Valancy has spent all her life following the expectations of her judgmental family: suppressing all negative opinions and emotions, avoiding any “improper” activities or pursuits, and putting up with endless teasing about her “old maid” status. Her only reprieve is the “Blue Castle” she visits in her daydreams. When she gets the news that she has a terminal heart condition […]

bit of an omnibus for the year end

Buried Deep and Other Stories by Naomi Novik

Our Evenings by Alan Hollinghurst

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

Anne of the Island by L.M. Montgomery

Anne of Ingleside by L.M. Montgomery

The Husbands by Holly Gramazio

Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close by Aminatou Sow, Ann Friedman

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Buried Deep and Other Stories (⭐⭐⭐⭐ but for the ones I read) Did I get this only to re-visit the world of Temeraire? You bet! I felt, I think like many people, that Novik got a bit fed up of her Dragon + Napoleonic Wars world by the end, with the whimsy and joy taken over by staid descriptions of military marches and food depots. This was a way to return to the original joy, especially since one of the retellings was of Pride and […]

Thanks to all the Cannonballers who put this on my radar!

The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

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30 Books in 30 Days, Vol. 2 Book 4/30 I think this is one of those books that I will love more and more as I inevitably revisit it again and again, but for now I’m holding strong at 4.5 stars, rounded down. Everybody I know who has read this little hidden gem loves it, and I’d sort of had it in the back of my mind for a special occasion, but my TBR Jar said now, so I read it now. And it was […]

A pretty quick re-read but there’s no shame in that!

The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

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Self Care: a book I’ve wanted to re-read for ages which I finally did–and little did I know that work was about to get rough, so it was well timed 😀 I’d had a pretty chill time of it at work, and thought I’d blow up my sleep schedule by starting and finishing this book in the time zone known as “GO TO SLEEP.” I’ve found myself wanting to re-read a whole subset of books for a while, and I’m thinking about giving myself a […]

There Is a Castle On an Island…I Like to Go there in my Sleep

The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery

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What a delightful book, I should have expected nothing less from the author behind the Anne of Green Gables book series I love wholeheartedly. You can read the description of this book and immediately know the entire plot. Nothing is surprising here, and I’m definitely not complaining. As it were, I learnt about this book from a fanfic retelling which warned of “spoilers” for the book, but seriously do you think that a book like this (with such high ratings, to boot) would end any other way? […]



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