Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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Give Me a Happy Ending Every TIme

Prisoner on Limnos by Lois McMaster Bujold

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This book concludes the Penric/Desdemona novella series and ends as expected but wraps everything up in a very satisfactory manner. Not only do we have the ongoing story of Penric and his unrequited love for Nikys becoming requited, but we also have him broaching an impregnable fortress to save his potential mother-in-law. In Orbas, Ny’s brother, Adelis, has gone off to fight a war for his new lord, leaving Nikys as a lady-in-waiting and poor Penric packing to return to his homeland as ordered by […]

Who the Heck is Mira?

Mira's Last Dance by Lois McMaster Bujold

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First of all, this is the fourth book in Ms. Bujold’s Penric and Desdemona series. I was bewildered by the format. It’s a small book, barely 150 pages, 8 chapters, and written in very large type. I wondered if it was a YA novel, but when I read the cover, I saw it was “a fantasy novella.” Why she didn’t consolidate the six stories into two normal-sized novels, I don’t know. Possibly because each story is separate and independent. Whatever the format, this is typical […]

Penric to the Rescue

Penric's Mission by Lois McMaster Bujold

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One of my favorite authors, Lois McMaster Bujold, has written a series of novellas about Penric and Desdemona, a wizard and a demon who help people needing the services of wizards and demons. Penric, tall, handsome, and charming, is just what a young widow named Nikys needs when her brother, General Adelis is accused of treason and blinded by boiling vinegar. Penric, an secret sorcerer and physician, posed as a simple courier when he provided the documents showing Adelis had sought employment in a neighboring […]

Don’t Promote Your Troubles Beyond Your Rank

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Continuing the adventures of Penric, the demon hosting priest of Lois McMaster Bujold’s World of the Five Gods, we have two more novellas: Penric’s Mission and Mira’s Last Dance. These are two very closely related stories, so much so that if felt more like reading on novel then reading two novellas. I enjoy these little stories quite a bit, so realizing that I had two unread stories to read was a treat. In Penric’s Mission, Penric is sent to spy on some duke from some […]

On the Nature of Gods and Forgiveness

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Penric and the Shaman is a novella set in Bujold’s World of the Five Gods, a world more thoroughly explored in the Chalion books. It is also the second novella featuring Penric and his demon Desdemona. Fortunately, it doesn’t need the other books to be sensible and can be read on its own, though of course there are elements that will make sense if you are already familiar with the world. I know Bujold gets the most fame for her Vorkosigan Saga, deservedly so, but […]



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