Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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Where Lovecraft Meets Spycraft

The Jennifer Morgue by Charles Stross

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I’m still making my way through the Laundry Files books, in hope that I’ll be reviewing the final one before the year is out. In my review of the Atrocity Archives I did mention that while the premise was good, the book was quite episodic and disjointed. To expand on that a little: re-reading it, it seems clear that the author was exploring two distinct ideas — mixing the public sector with eldritch horrors, and mixing espionage with eldritch horrors. Some of the later books […]

Hippos of the Deep South

American Hippo by Sarah Gailey

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In a world where the American Hippo bill passed (look it up, it was real!) and the vast Mississippi became the home of deadly feral hippo, Winslow Houndstooth and a crew of rogues, murderers, and con artists have been contracted to take it back. This book consists of the novellas River of Teeth and Taste of Marrow and two additional short stories, which all take place in this alternate United States and follow Winslow and his motley crew of hippo riders. Firstly, I love hippos, I love the idea of […]

Where Lovecraft Meets Tradecraft

The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross

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Charlie Stross finished up The Laundry Files series earlier this year, so I decided I should do a bit of a re-read.  It’s been at least 15 years since I’ve read some of these, so I thought a little brush up couldn’t hurt.  But I have to mention something weird about my friends first; when I did a re-read of the Obernewtyn series a while back, I mentioned that I started reading them based off a friend’s recommendation. And this friend didn’t do me the […]

Come for the tea, stay for the kisses.

The Raven Door by Amy Crook

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Greyson is a student in his final year of university. He’s shy and has a bit of a complex as he has never been in a relationship, and he has never been in love. Before he graduates and goes out into the world, he wants to know what love feels like. He saves up his money for a love potion, hoping that the experiment will grant him the insight he desires. Greyson goes to Aedan, a local Earth witch and a specialist in love spells […]

Please Search Hand-Pulled Noodles Near Me

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

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After the ghost kitchen they worked at is shut down, a group of robots decide to start up their own restaurant serving hand-pulled noodles, but anti-robot prejudice threatens their success. Immediately after reading this book, I looked up the nearest place I could get my hands on hand-pulled noodles, so in that regard this has been an absolute success. I have never had them before but I am somehow craving them anyway. I picked up this book because it’s been so highly recommended on Cannonball […]

Three sci-fi books making me think about robots and AI

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz

Rose/House by Arkady Martine

Service Model by Adrian Tchaikovsky

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The end of January to the very beginning of March has had the good fortune to have three excellent books looking at robots, AI, sentience, autonomy, finding meaning, and limitations on the flawed way humanity has programmed robots/AI.  While setting up this post, I just realized all the author’s first name start with A.  Huh, kind of interesting. First up was a novella by Annalee Newitz, Automatic Noodle.  This is the most fun and lighthearted of the bunch.  It is the year 2064, a few years […]



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