Cannonball Read 15

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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“So,” she heard his voice begin. He had a quiet voice, deep. “How does it feel to be an ex-token black?”

Come a Stranger (Tillerman Cycle #5) by Cynthia Voigt

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I’m enjoying my revisit to The Tillerman Cycle books, which were a favorite when I was a youth/teen. Though categorized as children’s books, they tackle adult themes with care and nuance that gives them a timeless quality. This book is the 5th in the 7 book series. Though the series is centered on the Tillerman family with teenaged Dicey as our protagonist, in this installment we get a deep dive into the life of Dicey’s best friend, Nina. We first met Mina in “Dicey’s Song,” […]

Not until I helped kill a man did I realize how complex an act a murder can be

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

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A month or two before, I would have been appalled at the idea of any murder at all. But that Sunday afternoon, as I actually stood watching one, it seemed the easiest thing in the world. ― Donna Tartt, The Secret History “Time, and repeated screenings, have endowed the memory with a menace the original did not possess. -Donna Tartt, The Secret History Based on my experience reading The Goldfinch, I knew that my next Donna Tartt book would be a serious undertaking. After being […]

“She was right, it would just be another box. It was going to be just another box for him, too, but he’d figured it out. You didn’t get out of one box without getting into another, and you didn’t get out of one box without getting into another, and you didn’t get out without it costing you. “

The Runner (Tillerman Cycle #4) by Cynthia Voigt

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The fourth in the series, this book follows Dicey’s uncle and Samuel’s namesake Bullet (with the moniker he had given himself) in his final year of high school. At this point in family history, the eldest brother has already gotten out of the house, and Liza (Dicey and sibling’s mother) has also left, leaving Bullet behind to fend for himself. He cares little for school, little for anyone really, aside from Patrice who he works for crabbing and oystering. With the onset of the Vietnam […]

Surprisingly Serious Truths from a Seriously Silly Guy

Vacationland by John Hodgman

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John Hodgman is many things: Daily Show correspondent, a “PC”, podcast guest and host, internet judge, former literary agent, and generally droll New England weirdo. He wrote several books prior to  Vacationland, and all of those books were collections of “facts”. I say “facts”, as that is what he might say as well: Hodgman (with the help of Jonathan Coulton) created three full books of completely made-up facts that he presented as being VERY true. They are a weird delight, and sometimes they are correct, […]

“When the mist rises, and the smiling man comes walking, you must avoid large places at night.”

Small Spaces by Arden, Katherine

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Ollie hasn’t been much of a people-person, but since her mother died the only solace she can seem to find is in books.  On a bike ride home from school, she comes across a woman sobbing by the lake, trying to talk herself into throwing an old black book into the water.  On a whim, Ollie steals the book and discovers within its pages a strange and spooky old story about the Webster family and their tragedy brought on by a sinister “smiling man.” The […]

3 swift sleighs, 4 lobster rolls, 8 skaters carving, and a blue jay in a spruce tree!

The Twelve Days of Christmas in New England by Toni Buzzeo

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The Twelve Days of Christmas in New England (also in a hardcover version) is just the Twelve Days of Christmas song with New England features. Fun, but a limited audience. I read the board book size. This is not a bad way to present the song. However, the extras at the end (Vermont you ski and Maine you eat lobsters. Yes, a simplistic explanation, but that is the idea: the highlights are hit) might be a bit too much for the younger audience. In the […]



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