Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


A Slight Disappointment and a Solid Continuation

Startup Hell by Caitlin Rozakis

The Brides of High Hill by Nghi Vo

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Startup Hell This was a fun urban romantasy that satirizes office culture. Main character Morgan is working for Zabloom, a company whose CEO keeps changing what their product is. When her boss dies while summoning demon Lucareoth (Luke) to make a soul-exchange Deal, Lucareoth ends up freed from his salt circle and Morgan agrees to help him get home before he gets in trouble with his own boss. Things do not go as planned, and they end up needing to try to make a Deal […]

“In-Yo would say that the war was won by silenced and nameless women, and it would be hard to argue with her.”

The Empress of Salt and Fortune by Nghi Vo

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Nowhere Bingo 26: Novella Dark Corner Selection: January 2026 Chih is a young cleric from the Singing Hills monastery who travels around the country searching for stories and history. At the shores of Lake Scarlet, Chih finds the abandoned dwelling where the former Empress In-Yo (the titular Empress of Salt and Fortune) spent her many years in exile. Chih encounters the elderly Rabbit, one of the Empress’s former handmaidens, who tells Chih stories of her own past and how it intertwined with that of the […]

We Get to Visit the Abbey

Mammoths at the Gates by Nghi Vo

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I love learning more about Cleric Chih, and I feel like we get to spend a little more time in their head with each successive novella. In this one, Chih arrives home to the Singing Hills Abbey after four years away, only to find mammoths at the gates and to discover their presence is related to the recent death of Chih’s mentor. So, in addition to grieving, Chih now has to worry about whether mammoths are going to storm the abbey gates. There are other […]

A Mouthful of Dust: The Value of a Low-Stakes Read

A Mouthful of Dust: The Singing Hills Cycle #6 by Nghi Vo

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I have been reading through the Singing Hills Cycle series since 2022. They have served as bite-sized treats and motivation to return to reading usually during a lull. Given the time between reading each book, I would struggle to tell you what’s happened in previous stories at this point. I think I keep returning to the series because of Chih and Almost Brilliant. They are a lovely pair of characters to accompany from story to story. A Mouthful of Dust is the sixth installment of […]

My Favorite Singing Hills Book So Far

Into the Riverlands by Nghi Vo

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I’ve been reading The Singing Hills Cycle novellas in publication order, even though they can be read in any order, and this third book is my favorite so far. It almost feels like a comfort read, even though there are moments when Chih and their companions are in danger. In this one, Chih and their neixin Almost Brilliant come across a martial artist and her companion and soon after meet a couple who are more than they seem. They travel in this group through part of […]

Storytelling to Keep Tigers at Bay

When the Tiger Came Down the Mountain by Nghi Vo

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cbr17bingo – Black (4th BINGO, I think) I am once again impressed at how much Nghi Vo can fit into a novella. She conveys so much about the world of the Singing Hills Cycle in so few pages. In this one sentence alone, for example, we get humor, history, and religion: “Not long after Dieu skirted the Battle of Kirshan—where General Peirong was killed by a raging bull that went on to become the king of Kirshan—she came around a bend in the road to find […]



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