Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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I like you just the way you are

The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

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This is one of the sweetest stories I’ve ever read. It’s about difference, exclusion, prejudice, unconventional families, the magic of love and inclusion, which all sounds lovely and perhaps a bit cliché. The thing is, author TJ Klune writes about these topics in a way that is sometimes surprising and always effective. Klune has created a world in which magic and “monsters” exist, and those children who show signs of having magic are separated from the rest of society and put in orphanages run by […]

“The things we fear the most are often the things we should fear the least. It’s irrational, but it’s what makes us human. And if we’re able to conquer those fears, then there is nothing we’re not capable of.”

The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune

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In One Word: Joyful Cannonball Read Bingo Square : Home A good friend of mine was reading this book for a friend book club and I nosed my way in with a jolt, “Um, ‘scuse me? Book Club did you say? What book??” That gathering of people has yet to materialize but I am filled with utter glee that this book came into my life. What. A. Delight. If you are looking for something uplifting, fun, and funny, look no further than this charming tale […]

“These scratches are a history. They tell a story.”

The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

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Linus Baker is a cog in a bureaucratic machine. He is a case worker at the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, or DICOMY. He is average in nearly every way: average build, average house, average desk job. Everything in his life is routine from his bus ride to work, to grinning and bearing it when he has to put up with his boss on a power-trip or his neighbor butting her way into his life, to the detailed reports he completes for all of […]

Three books I loved and one I most certainly did not.

The Overdue Life of Amy Byler by Kelly Harms

The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

Boyfriend Material by Alexis Hall

The Mall by Megan McCafferty

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More quick reviews as the 2020 deadline approaches…and yes, I’ll be including blurbs because I read some of these MONTHS ago. The books I loved: First off, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler. Blurb: Overworked and underappreciated, single mom Amy Byler needs a break. So when the guilt-ridden husband who abandoned her shows up and offers to take care of their kids for the summer, she accepts his offer and escapes rural Pennsylvania for New York City. Usually grounded and mild mannered, Amy finally lets […]

“But I can have spiders in my head as long as I don’t let them consume me.” #CBRBingo – Happy

The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune

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This was very sweet and I was extremely charmed by it. I didn’t end up giving it the fifth star, because shmoopsy mostly doesn’t work for me, and this did get a bit shmoopsy there at the end. (Shmoopsy is a technical term.) But overall, this was witty and so sweet and heartwarming, with a light undercurrent of dark humor. I loved the worldbuilding; the gentle bite of the satire combined so well with the big hearts of the main characters. Briefly (because I think […]

One of the best books I’ll read this year

The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune

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#CBR12 Bingo: I Wish (Travelling anywhere right now seems like an utter impossibility, but I would love to be able to hang out on Marsyas Island with its cast of unique residents) Linus Baker does not live an exciting or interesting life. When he’s not visiting orphanages and checking up on children and teens with unusual abilities or magical powers, he sits in his utterly anonymous cubicle and writes detailed and thorough reports. He goes home to his non-descript little house, occasionally exchanges words with his […]



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