Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


Join the CBR18 Book Bingo Reading Challenge—Now Underway!   

Blue Notes

Cahokia Jazz by Franics Spufford

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Reading this book was a unique experience for me. Since it focuses on First Nations in America, some parts are tough and sad. I borrowed it from the library and wasn’t sure I’d finish before it was due, especially because of the heavy moments. But I felt I owed it to the main character to see it through. That’s never happened to me before. I’m glad I finished Cahokia Jazz. The story has really stayed with me, even though I’ve returned the book. The story […]

The island might be unspoiled but some of its residents really stink…

Summer Shadows by John Harris Dunning, Ricardo Cabral, Brad Simpson and Jim Campbell

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The cover of Summer Shadows by John Harris Dunning, Ricardo Cabral, Brad Simpson and Jim Campbell is a tad misleading. It makes things look like a teen thriller in the line of a slightly darker Christopher Pike, RL Stine, or Richie Tankersley Cusick and the like. In other words, something from the late 1980s or early 1990s when I was a teen and actually reading realistic paranormal.  Instead of a “teeny bopper thriller with supernatural” we get sex, drugs, and vampires. We get some downright […]

Around the World Around the World

Night Prayers by Santiago Gamboa

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Very mixed feelings on Night Prayers. Ultimately, it’s one of the best things I’ve read in 2025. It’s also one of the more frustrating. Gamboa writes in the style of his Latin American contemporaries such as Bolaño and Marquez. And for the most part, he does it well. This is a style I always enjoy sampling, even if it can frustrate me at times with its tangents and magic realism. I quit the book several times in the beginning but was inexorably drawn back to it and […]

Amigos

Friends Helping Friends by Patrick Hoffman

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My mother recently asked me what “noir” means in the context in which I often use it: reading and watching. I tried to explain to her that noir isn’t the same as classic mystery or hardboiled in that there’s an event that happens that permanently changes the behaviors of all persons, drawing them into difficult circumstances. But that felt like a weak definition to me. So I’ll roll with Megan Abbott’s classic definition in this interview with LitHub… In noir, everyone is fallen, and right […]

Two Writers

We Are Watching by Alison Gaylin

Saint of the Narrows Street by William Boyle

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I finished two books this past week and enjoyed them to varying degrees. One was by a favorite author, another by an author I’ve struggled with in the past. Let’s get to the latter first since I like going in reading order… We Are Watching**** I’ve always felt cold toward Alison Gaylin’s work. She’s a very good writer and yet, there’s an emotional distance in her books that I can’t land with. It’s the same issue I get when watching most Christopher Nolan movies: yeah […]

Greatest? City in the World

Manhattan Noir by ed. Lawrence Block

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Read as part of CBR16 Bingo: ring. One of the suggestions for this category was “reaching for the brass ring.” Many move to Manhattan to reach for the brass ring. Most of these stories are about how they failed.  Sorry to those who actually read all my reviews because I know I repeat myself constantly. But man, I just love the Akhasic Noir series. I already love cities, those I’ve been to, lived in, can only dream of. And there’s just nothing better than Manhattan. […]



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