Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


An Interesting Addition to Vampire Canon

This Ravenous Fate by Hayley Dennings

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This was a highly anticipated release between the premise and the setting, but after finishing it I’m sitting here unsure how I feel about it. Layla Quinn and Elise Saint were best friends until several years ago with Layla’s parents were killed and she was turned into a reaper. She especially blames the Saints and most especially Elise, because Elise betrayed her trust by telling her father, Tobias Saint, about Layla’s parents’ plan to help the reapers and meet with the Harlem clan. Because of […]

Trans YA horror in a small town

Lockjaw by Matteo L. Cerilli

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Lockjaw by Matteo L Cerilli is a YA horror that explores small town niceness and what makes a monster real. I’m still fairly newly into horror and very particular, but I like seeing the themes of monstrosity explored through marginalized lenses, so I took the chance to read Lockjaw with glee. This is a story told from several points of view and does some time jumps that aren’t obvious, for reasons that become evident about halfway through the book. I found several elements absolutely heartbreaking, […]

Murder Triad? Yes, Please

Consort of Fire by Kit Rocha

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I don’t remember how I ended up with a copy of Consort of Fire. I might have received a copy directly from the publisher (Montlake). I might have seen it in a bookstore. I might have bought it on Amazon. I honestly have no idea, because I feel like I’ve had it for a million years. So when my podcast co-host mentioned that we should read a romantasy book for our next When In Romance book club, my eye was immediately drawn to Consort of Fire on my […]

Love and Grief on the Oregon Coast

Heartwaves by Anita Kelly

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Every Anita Kelly book I read is my new favorite, and this is the one currently holding the trophy. When we meet Mae, they have just spread their best friend’s ashes at the beach in a small Oregon town. Almost on a whim, she decides to move to this town—in part because she wants to be closer to Jesus (the friend, not the Lord), and in part because there’s a storefront for sale on Main Street. What better way to honor Jesus’s legacy than to […]

Frankenstein but plants and gay!

A Botanical Daughter by Noah Medlock

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I saw a reel on Instagram from the author talking about this book, and I was immediately sold. Frankenstein? Queer? Messy, messy characters? Sign me up! And this absolutely delivers on all fronts. The beginning of A Botanical Daughter is a little slow, but it perfectly sets the scene of Grimfern, an estate inside a greenhouse outside the closest village, and the three main characters – Gregor, botanist and lord of Grimfern; Simon, taxidermist and romantic partner to Gregor; and Jenny, local village girl whose […]

Queer awakenings aren’t just for teens

Cash Delgado is Living the Dream by Tehlor Kay Mejia

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I was a little hesitant to pick this book up after I couldn’t get into Sammy Espinoza, but I’m so glad I gave this a shot after all! Even though this takes place in the same town and there’s several Sammy cameos, this absolutely stands on its own with its focus on Cash and wanting to save Joyce’s, a local dive bar. This is also a book where “everything is political” really keeps coming to mind in the way it challenges gentrification and is so […]



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