Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Home-Grown Monsters

Ring Shout by P. Djeli Clark

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Who says all the fantasies with sword- wielding heroes and heroines have to be in Middle-earth, Westeros, or even our dreams of Africa past—what the Harlem Renaissance poet Countee Cullen reminisced as “copper sun or scarlet sea”?…Fantasy stories often feature characters in medieval settings taking on monsters. I figured a young Black woman in 1920s Georgia could be that character too. Even gave her her own sword. The monsters she has to fight are plucked right out of our own history—perhaps made more terrifying because […]

“When death stares people in the face, they revert to their true self.”

The Inheritance by Ilona Andrews

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CBR17 Bingo: Free (swapping out Migrant) In a world pretty much like our own, people were just going about their ordinary lives when suddenly, everything changed. Gigantic portals to some other mystical dimension began opening all over the world. It soon became clear that if the portals were left unattended for a while, hordes of horrific monsters emerged and proceeded to wreak havoc. Once specialised teams started breaching the gates, they discovered each portal contained a lot of rare and valuable minerals and resources, as […]

Something’s Wrong

Of Monsters and Mainframes by Barbara Truelove

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I’m going to be honest; I picked this one up based on the cover alone.  And like they tell you not to do, I did sort of judge this book by its cover. Well, the cover and the first section of the book. And I thought I’d be dealing with a short set of vignettes about pulp horror monsters in space. Turns out that was a bit of a lowball there—there is actually a story arc that we follow throughout the book.  Poor Dementer, has […]

Greed, pretty princesses and monsters

Darkly She Goes by Hubert

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After reading Darkly She Goes by Hubert and illustrated by Vincent Mallié (translated by L Benson and color by Bruno Tatti) I realized that I will be haunted by Hubert’s writing. After reading Beauty by them, I figured nothing would shock me about their style. But Darkly She Goes is a terribly odd, weird, insane ride. There were unlikable characters, situations and the ending was unsatisfying. The images were dark, violent and awkward. Yet, I was mesmerized from page one and could not stop reading. […]

Well Halloween is coming up so this is a good time to talk about this book

The Last Halloween, Book 1: Children by Abby Howard

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When you like Halloween, the title The Last Halloween, Book 1: Children will catch your attention. It didn’t hurt that this was a big ol’ fat book. So, “Abby Howard” (I said) “you have yourself an interesting book. Okay that cover is a bit funky, but I’m a big kid, I can handle it.”  I’ll let you decide how well I did (or did not) handle it. Man! Is this one screwy book! There is nothing about it that is likable….yet it is a GREAT […]

Krampus kramps your naughty style

Tonight Is Krampus Night by Kyle Sullivan

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One thing I try to do every year is to find at least three Christmas books and at least one other winter holiday book. The Christmas books I try to find are a religious one, a more fun one (Santa, or silly reindeer have been in the past) and an Other book (maybe spiritual but it hits the spirit of things). I try to find one Hanukkah and one Winter Solstice, or something that is a holiday and/or just fun. This year I found a […]



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