Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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In which I non-review a favorite book.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium, #1) by Stieg Larsson

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Not quite sure what I want to say this go-round. I hate reviewing favorite books. There’s something about the headspace you get in when you’re reading one. It’s just so passive and full of unthinking pleasure. I just let books happen to me when I’m like that. And I don’t want to talk about it okay! It’s private. I loved this book back when I first read it, and then again when I re-read it a couple years later, and now I love it again […]

“Let us step into the night and pursue that flighty temptress, adventure.”

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, #6) by J.K. Rowling

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This is my second to last of these reviews. I have actually enjoyed engaging with these books on a different level. Normally when I read them, I just zoom through and enjoy. I don’t usually stop to analyze. Speaking of not stopping to notice things, look to your left. I have looked at that image for several months now and I am only now noticing that it can be either a book (like the Prince’s Potions book) OR Dumbledore shooting sparks with his wand (the […]

Third time through, just as great. #CBRBingo – I Love This

Carry On by Rainbow Rowell

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This book works on multiple levels for me: *It’s swoony and I love the characters. I find it comfortable and reassuring, like a big fluffy blanket. *It’s a smart take on Chosen One stories, upending tropes and challenging expectations. The first time through you think you know what’s going to happen, and then it doesn’t, and something much cooler happens instead. *It’s funny and incisive, and has good things to say about the human emotional cost of magic, of being caught inside a fantasy story. […]

“It does not make sense. It cannot exist. It’s impossible.”

The Subtle Knife (His Dark Materials, #2) by Philip Pullman

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“What he couldn’t say was that he longed for his father as a lost child yearns for home. That comparison wouldn’t have occurred to him, because home was the place he kept safe for his mother, not the place others kept safe for him.” As a kid, I was really into this book. I ran across it in the library one day, years after I read the first one. I loved the whole parallel universes jag, and it was undercut with this darkness most of […]

“Give her hell from us, Peeves.” (This review is the reason I’m four months behind.)

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Harry Potter, #5) by J.K. Rowling

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This was the most I have ever liked this book. (And that’s saying something, because I remember losing my mind over it when it was first published.) I’m kicking myself for not writing up some notes after I finished because it’s been since May that I finished this, and I’ve lost most of that newly gleaned insight. Maybe going through these quotes will help bring some of it back. Also, just know going in, I do not hold with any nonsense about blaming Harry for […]

“Kill the spare.”

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter, #4) by J.K. Rowling

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Well, so I said I wasn’t going to wait to write this, and then I waited to write this. Over two months. I start reading book six tomorrow*. [loud moaning noise] (when fun things become chores) [loud moaning noise] *And then I waited almost two more weeks after writing that sentence. The thing is, it’s not the review writing, it’s the quote transcribing! Something I have learned about myself is I don’t like doing it! I’m not going to make any more promises. That way […]



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