Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


Join the CBR18 Book Bingo Reading Challenge—Now Underway!   

Whose Frankenstein?

Her Frankenstein by Norikazu Kawashima

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CBR18 Bingo – Friends: because it’s about an abusive toxic friendship. Her Frankenstein by Norikazu Kawashima is a fun little horror story. Kawashima had a brief career doing horror manga in the 80s. His work is classic and beloved and simultaneously forgotten. The volume has a nice overview of his obscure career. Although it can’t be that obscure if it got officially translated to English. The story is about Tetsuo. He can’t function if he doesn’t have a mean woman belittling him for her own […]

No one has enemies

Vinland Saga by Makoto Yukimura

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CBR18 Bingo – Versus: it’s literally about Vikings. My tolerance for real violence is much lower than my tolerance for fictional violence. So when I read fictionalized versions of real war, I bounce between “cool battle!” and “I hate that this happened.” Makoto Yukimura’s Vinland Saga heavily leans toward the “I hate that this happened” reaction because the battles aren’t cool. They’re just violent and sad. Thorfinn is a Viking boy in Iceland. He has a happy life that’s full of sheep and stories from […]

It means ‘from me to you’

Kimi ni Todoke vols. 1-25, 27-30 by Karuho Shiina

Kimi ni Todoke vol. 26 by Karuho Shiina

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CBR18 Bingo – 26: volume 26 was all about my favorite character. The primary conflict of Kimi ni Todoke is that the protagonist looks like the girl from The Ring. Sawako’s name even resembles the girl from The Ring’s – Sadako. Because of her pale skin and evil blunt bangs, Sawako has never been able to make many friends, despite being the sweetest darling in the universe. But things change in high school. Generally, it’s a love story. The romance between Sawako and Kazehaya is […]

Dumb in many ways, but at least (some) characters know it

Ichi the Witch (vols. 1-2) by Osamu Nishi, Shiro Usazaki

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Ichi the Witch is, at least in the first two volumes, both generically entertaining and trope-ily generic. Clueless hero with one big talent that’s pretty handy? Check. Know-it all mentor/senior student? Check. Set up for harem comedy? Also check.  Basic premise: only women can wield magic and be witches. Ichi is a guy, a hunter who lives near a rural area, who accidentally (kind of, he intentionally interferes but…) absorbs the magic of the nearly impossible-to-defeat Uroro who is about to destroy rock-star witch Desscaras, […]

Backstory Can Be Relevant, Who Knew

Spy X Family vols. 14-15 by Tatsuya Endo

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Turns out that sometimes backstory time can be both interesting and maybe even relevant. Spy x Family is essentially an action-comedy where a spy has to create a family to get close to his mark; the gal he marries is secretly an assassin, the daughter he adopts is secretly a telepath (but she’s 6, meaning she understanding things not the conventional way a lot), and the family dog has some kind of foretelling (but is also a dog, and thus cannot speak people). For most […]

When the overshadowed friend gets her turn as the MC

The White Cat’s Revenge as Plotted from the Dragon’ King’s Lap by Aki, Kureha, Yamigo

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This was a library impulse grab. The White Cat’s Revenge as Plotted from the Dragon’ King’s Lap (v.1) is as you might guess from the title one of the trendy isekai manga with a long-ish title.  It is also as you might guess total fluff, wish fulfillment for anyone who might have felt overshadowed or overlooked. IT’s basically a Cinderella tale of two childhood friends, one of whom (Ruri) never seems to get to enjoy things for herself thanks to the presence of her golden […]



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