Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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Finding your color

Red: A Crayon’s Story by Michael Hall

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This was one of my holiday exchange books and my second time reading Red: A Crayon’s Story by Michael Hall. Being able to read it again, I was able to see things I missed before. It had more charm for me this time around. And this second read helped me compare it to other books of the same theme. The first time around reading Hall’s picture book, the subject was new to the scene and felt abrasive. While I am still not a hundred percent […]

New York Times Book Review told us:

Just Because by Mac Barnett

I Miss My Grandpa by Jin Xiaoling

The Famer by Abadia Ximo

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New York Times Book Review told us a few months back what their 67th annual list of Best Illustrated Children’s Books for 2019 was. I picked up one or two here and there and today I found myself reading three. My “like” of Just Because by Mac Barnett comes from Isabelle Arsenault’s illustrations. They are simple, with a lack of a traditional color, but the details are far from simplistic. The story (a child asking all the questions even many adults want to know) is […]

Don’t judge a picture book by the first page or two

My Cousin Momo by Zachariah Ohora

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At first, I did not like My Cousin Momo by Zachariah Ohora. It is a typical story of the new kid (in this case a cousin) is not cool because he does not know how to do any of the games or things that they do. Of course, once everyone starts trying new things, they find out that Momo knows how to have fun after all. Plus, sometimes they can all agree that their way is more fun than how Momo does it. It just […]

The Cool Crowd

The Cool Bean by Jory John

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The Cool Bean is part of Jory John’s series that includes The Good Egg, The Bad Seed and The Good Egg Presents: The Great Eggscape! (coming in February 2020). The Cool Bean is just like the other stories in this group. There are more than a few puns about being “a cool bean” and bean puns in general. The story is simple: Our narrator used to hang out with a handful of beans in olden times (as long ago as last year), but this year […]

Social Themes told the modern way

How to Put a Whale in a Suitcase by Raul Guridi

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How to Put a Whale in a Suitcase. Um…. okay? Was my first thought when I saw this title. Then quickly forgot about it. I then saw the display for our holiday/winter newsletter and there it was. Big as life. Or as big as a 0.4″ H x 9.5″ L x 6.6″ W (0.45 lbs.) 32 pages book can be. A quick look at the thinness and the modest amount of text, and I thought, “pffft! I can do this in no time.”  Yeah, do […]

Get your red hot and garlic and BBQ and oh so much more crickets here

Chirp by Kate Messner

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Chirp is an age appropriate (10-14) book dealing with some heavy subjects.  But overall, they are presented respectfully and are accessible to all readers. There were a few bumps in the plot for me, but I felt it was a decent story and for certain the style that you have come to expect from the author. Kate Messner writes about Mia, a young girl moving back to Vermont after several years living in Boston. Her parents and she have come back to help her grandmother […]



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