Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Not Bad, but Not for Me

Intermezzo by Sally Rooney

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This was not a bad book, but it has confirmed that I am not the right audience for Sally Rooney. I didn’t really care for Normal People but thought I’d give this a chance because some people who didn’t like Normal People did like this one. And I did indeed prefer Intermezzo, but not as much as I’d hoped. A large part of the problem is that I disliked Peter, one of the POV characters. His self-pity, while realistic in its duration, grew old, and I didn’t care for […]

Amazing Emotional Story

One Blood by Denene Millner

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Oof, this is a seriously intense and emotional story, but so compellingly told. Told through the experiences of three women – Grace, LoLo, and Rae – it chronicles the ties of family and motherhood as Black women and the ways intergenerational trauma ripples and impacts people moving forward. Grace is a teen when her mother is murdered by her boyfriend and her grandmother is taken away for claiming a white woman’s baby was white and not a product of an affair with a Black man […]

Sometimes the Hype is Real

Yellowface by R. F. Kuang

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I don’t love reading books that have all the buzz. The ones on all of the must read most anticipated best of lists. That get picked for all of the book clubs. I’m not inherently opposed to popularity. If anything, I find myself too swayed by all of the opinions. I’m overcritical or underwhelmed usually. It helps if I let some time pass, so it doesn’t feel so in my face. Library hold lists make this easier. My hold for Yellowface came in and I […]

The Serial Killer Book I’ve Been Waiting For

Notes On An Execution by Danya Kukafka

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I went in to this book so wary! I’m not a huge fan of serial killers or the true crime mania that glorifies men who murder (mostly) women. So even though I’d seen glowing review after breathless recommendation of Notes On an Execution, I doubted I’d get past 20%. I am never so pleased to be wrong than when it comes to loving an unexpected book. The premise of this one is simple, it is the day of Ansel Power’s execution. There are brief chapters […]

An emotional story of family and love

This Way Out by Tufayel Ahmed

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This Way Out is beautiful, emotional, and such a great story of Amar figuring out how to reconcile being gay with being Muslim, being Bangladeshi while loving a white Englishman. This Way Out opens with Amar telling his family via WhatsApp that he’s engaged and his fiancée is a man, but then he hides from the responses from his siblings because he doesn’t actually feel ready for what their response will be. His family’s reaction is complicated and because he’s still coping with grief of […]

Lyndsay Faye’s best… so far

The Paragon Hotel by Lyndsay Faye

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I am so happy to report that this novel was truly a great read, sure to be on my favorites list at the end of the year. I was a little thrown by not loving my last Lyndsay Faye book, but faintingviolet rightly pointed out that it was her first published book, so it’s natural for it to not be as good. It does appear that Faye is only getting better and better. I loved Jane Steele and I LOVED The Paragon Hotel. The story […]



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