Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


Join the CBR18 Book Bingo Reading Challenge—Now Underway!   

Confusing, but fun

To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis

by Leave a Comment

Nowhere Book Bingo: Award Winner (Won the Hugo and Locus awards in 1998, plus a bunch of others) Smart Bitches Summer Bingo: Scene on a boat or body of water (there’s a lot of rowing on the river) CBR16 Bingo: Tech (time travel requires pretty specific technology) This is the second book in the Oxford Time Travel series, but you really don’t need to have read the first one, Doomsday Book, to understand and enjoy this one. In the universe these books are set in, […]

Games Don’t Seem Fun?

Press Reset: Ruin and Recovery in the Video Game Industry by Jason Schreier

by Leave a Comment

Not too long ago I reviewed gaming journalist Jason Schreier’s Blood, Sweat, and Pixels – a book looking at the development of a dozen games in the 2000s and 2010s. Due to the size of the games and the graphic fidelity, hundreds of people can work YEARS on a AAA game (a major game). It’s controlled chaos and tons of crunch (working nonstop for extended periods). Schreier told some compelling stories in that book, and in this followup he explores what it’s like to have […]

“Where do you stop? That’s the trickiest part.”

Blood, Sweat, and Pixels: The Triumphant, Turbulent Stories Behind How Video Games Are Made by Jason Schreier

by Leave a Comment

I bought this book when it came out in 2017. Ironically, I didn’t get around to reading it until a camping trip this past weekend! It seems silly to go out into the woods to read about video games. However, I’m glad I did have the time and space to finally sit down with a fun read instead of a “should” read. In the end, we only have so much time on earth, so why not do what makes us happy? For me maybe that’s […]

“If there’s a purpose to life it’s to love and communicate.”

Cyberville: Clicks, Culture, and the Creation of an Online Town by Stacy Horn

by Leave a Comment

A tip of the hat for tech & culture writer Joanne McNeil for mentioning this book in her excellent Lurking. Cyberville is the story of New York City’s 1990s “online salon,” Echo. Stacy Horn founded Echo and authored this book. However,  the book features clips of lengthy discussions from Echo and its Echoids, so in effect the book is collectively authored. As are all online communities. That’s really what this book is about – the co-creation of online communities. While it was written in 1998, […]

Mad Money

The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley's Pursuit of Power by Max Chafkin

by 5 Comments

My journey through Silicon Valley continues as I learn more and more about its major events and players. And boy, do all of these guys really like Ayn Rand. Like many, I was disappointed at the downfall of Gawker. While I felt like the site (and its offshoots) could be too proud of itself and unaware that its establishment as an institution made their criticisms of institutions a little flat, I think it performed an important service to the media in terms of calling out bs. Being […]

Technocracy

Uncanny Valley: A Memoir by Anna Wiener

by Leave a Comment

By design, I know as little about the tech world as possible. I’ve never spent time in northern California, rarely read tech articles (except if they’re bashing the gaetekeepers of social media), and just generally avoid news of that world. I’ve been dipping my toe in the water lately, first with Bad Blood and now this one. That has less to do with curiosity about the world they depict and more to their popularity. I’m glad this one was written by someone my age because I don’t […]



Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo