Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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“War doesn’t determine who’s right. War determines who remains.”

The Poppy War (The Poppy War, #1) by R.F. Kuang

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It’s super gross that this book was written by a nineteen year old on her gap year. I thought it was good before I learned that’s how old she was when she wrote it but now I’m straight up sickened. I’m just thinking about the kind of shit I was up to when I was nineteen, and it was basically attending classes, going to marching band practice, afternoon naps in my dorm, and eating infinity burritos from the burrito cart. Kuang was basically like, Oh, […]

“burn before reading”

This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El -Mohtar & Max Gladstone

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If this is what the Time War feels like, then I volunteer as tribute. This two-hander from Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone burns bright right in the center of your chest and dares you to put it out. Red and Blue are operatives on either side of a war that has been going on since before time existed and well past the end of the universe. They are fierce and wild warriors; brilliant minds matched with brilliant and sharp teeth. They claw their way through […]

“Anyway, we delivered the bomb.”

In Harm's Way by Doug Stanton

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A lifelong Jaws fan, the most I ever really knew about the USS Indianapolis was what was related by Quint in one of my favourite scenes in cinema, so when I spotted this book, complete with its same-surname-as-me author, it was a must buy. It turns out – as always –  that reality is far, far more horrifying than any Hollywood blockbuster could ever wish to be. For those who don’t know what happened to the Indianapolis and her men, a brief synopsis. Fresh from […]

Army Chief of Staff Reading List

Dereliction of Duty: Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam by H.R. McMaster

Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War by Paul Scharre

The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500 to 2000 by Paul Kennedy

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I read all three of these books as they are on the Army Chief of Staff Reading List.  That list is a bi-annual list the highest ranking member of the Army publishes for professional development.  Sometimes the lists are highly curated and you can see the purpose and direction intended.  Sometimes, they are just a huge collection of non-fiction books that people have been told to read for years.  The current list has 120+ books and seems to have no defining theme.  The books in […]

Mysterious as the dark side of the Moon

The Magnolia Sword: A Ballad of Mulan by Sherry Thomas

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Official book description: CHINA, 484 A.D. A Warrior in Disguise: All her life, Mulan has trained for one purpose: to win the duel that every generation in her family must fight. If she prevails, she can reunite a pair of priceless heirloom swords separated decades earlier, and avenge her father, who was paralyzed in his own duel. Then a messenger from the Emperor arrives, demanding that all families send one soldier to fight the Rouran invaders in the north. Mulan’s father cannot go. Her brother […]

The Revolutionary War in Three Volumes

Bunker Hill: A City, A Siege, A Revolution by Nathaniel Philbrick

Valiant Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution by Nathaniel Philbrick

In the Hurricane's Eye: The Genius of George Washington and the Victory at Yorktown by Nathaniel Philbrick

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***This is a truly terrible review of three books.  If you like the Revolutionary War, read them.*** I first learned about Nathaniel Philbrick while doing research for a presentation on one of the commanders of the Battle of Bunker Hill, COL William Prescott.  While I planned to read the book then, I just did what most people do while preparing a presentation, I read only the things that were super relevant to the project.  I told myself for years that I would come back to […]



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