Cannonball Read 15

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

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“We were not liars, but but we made our own truths …”

The Book of Goose by Yiyun Li

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Agnes is in her late twenties, married to Earl and living in America in the 1960s, when she hears about the death of her childhood friend, Fabienne. It’s mentioned, almost in passing, in a letter from her mother, who still lives in Saint Remy in France, the farm village where Agnes grew up. Upon hearing this news, Agnes reflects on her childhood with Fabienne, which is the main focus of the novel (not to mention Agnes’ life). As young girls coming of age in the […]

“The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you’re uncool.”

I Would be Doing this Anyway by Jia Tolentino

Rewards by Emma Cline

Crewelwork by Justin Torres

The Tomorrow Box by Curtis Sittenfeld

If You Are Lonely and You Know It by Yiyun Li

The Summer House by Cristina Henriquez

Me and Carlos by Tom Perrotta

Simplexity by Kiley Reid

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Ahh, Lester Bangs. Or at least, Philip Seymour Hoffman as Lester Bangs via Cameron Crowe in Almost Famous. Did I just grab this quote because it features the word “currency”? Well…yes and no. Currency, my latest dive into Amazon Original Stories (but not the latest collection released) describes itself as being about “friends, trends, and dividends”. The link between these eight stories is the currency between people; social, professional, and personal transactions made when money is too much to offer or not enough to cover. The players […]

There’s a Reason for Every Relationship

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers by Yiyun Li

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A collection of ten short stories, this is a poignant and honest look at the lives of utterly ordinary people that play out in front of cultural constraints and political intrusions. Topics like the relationship between husband and wife, filial duty, the families that we make ourselves, and the societal expectations that put shackles on even the most human experiences are explored in a somber but touching way. Almost all of these stories are amazing, and it’s hard for me to pick a favourite. The […]

And fancy seeing you here, Nikolai said.

Where Reasons End by Yiyun Li

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(Trigger Warning – Suicide) The title of this novel is a play on the classic phrase “Where Reason Ends Faith Begins”, a phrase in which I’ve always found rather shallow. I am not really a person of faith, and I have a pretty literal mind with most things (though I do love fantasy and science fiction). And so when I think about what faith must stand for in my own mind, I think more simply of how time softens, resilience and selfhood, and self-preservation, and […]



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