Memoirs Aren't Fairytales: A Story of Addiction by Marni Mann (CBR-V #39)

Cannonball Read V: Book #39/52
Published: 2011
Pages: 256
Genre: Fiction

First of all, this book is not an actual memoir, contrary to the title. It's the fictional account of a young girl's descent into drug addiction. Nicole was sexually assaulted her freshman year of college and decides to flee her home in Maine and make a new start in Boston with her friend Eric. They both experiment with other drugs before eventually becoming hardcore heroin addicts. 

This book is dark and ugly. If you've ever read anything by Ellen Hopkins, this book is very similar to her books (minus being written in verse form). It's just one horrible thing happening to these people after another. It's also beautifully written and you can tell the author did her homework. It was very hard to distinguish between this novel and an actual memoir. 

The characters seemed so real. The people that flow in and out of Nicole's life are just as broken as she is. There's Sunshine, the prostitute who teaches Nicole how to make some extra heroin cash and my favorite, Claire, the elderly lady who lives in the same building as Nicole and forms a peculiar friendship with her. Their relationship is so heartbreaking to watch as Nicole tries and fails again and again to get clean for Claire. 


The ending is bittersweet. Don't read this book if you're expecting a nice, wrapped up ending where everyone goes to rehab and has a happy rest of their life. There's plenty of death and heartbreak. Like the title says, memoirs aren't fairytales. 

Under the Dome by Stephen King (CBR-V #29)

Cannonball Read V: Book #29/52
Published: 2009
Pages: 1092
Genre: Science Fiction

Under the Dome is a monster of a novel, clocking in at almost 1100 pages. I'm kind of a sucker for long, epic novels, so I decided to tackle this book for a second time. I read this book when it was first released in 2009 and loved it. I wanted to re-read it before I watched the TV show that just came out based on it. 

The basic premise is pretty simple: An impenetrable dome falls over the town of Chester's Mill, Maine. No one knows what it is or where it came from. The outside world is just as baffled as the people inside the dome. 

As with most of Stephen King's longer novels, there are a LOT of characters to wade through. Fortunately, you have plenty of time to sort everyone out with 1100 pages. One of the main characters is a guy named Dale Barbara, or Barbie. He's an ex-military guy who was a cook at a local restaurant. He was trying to leave town when the dome fell and trapped him inside. He was leaving town due to a pretty nasty, unfair fight with a guy named Junior over a girl. Junior is a sociopath who didn't fall far from the tree. His father, "Big Jim" Rennie is a local used car salesman who uses the dome to his advantage as he tries to take over the town. Big Jim is involved in a bunch of unethical things (with one of the town pastors, no less) while hiding behind the facade of being religious. 


There are tons of other characters and plot points that would take forever to go into, but I still really enjoyed this book. The second reading was a little slower due to already knowing the somewhat disappointing ending, but the interesting characters and story arcs make the journey worth it even if the ending wasn't great. 

The Woman by Jack Ketchum & Lucky McKee (CBR-V #26)

Cannonball Read V: Book #26/52
Published: 2011
Pages: 208
Genre: Horror

I picked up this book because I really like Jack Ketchum for the most part (The Girl Next Door is one of my favorite horror novels) and I really enjoyed the first two books in this particular series (Off Season and Offspring). I didn't even know there was a third book until recently.

The Woman would read fine as a stand alone book, but if you've read Off Season and Offspring, you have more of a background on who the Woman is and where she came from. After the massacre at the end of Offspring, she is wandering the woods on her own and is found by a guy named Christopher Cleek. For some reason that I'm not entirely sure of (just insane, I guess?) he decides to take the Woman and lock her up in his cellar then try and bring his wife and kids in on the fun of trying to "domesticate" her. Turns out Chris is a pretty sick guy (and so is his pervert son) and there's lots of blood and rape. 

Sadly, this book disappointed me, especially since I know Ketchum is capable of a much better story. This one felt like he just sort of threw it together last minute. It doesn't help that I just recently read the excellent The Summer I Died, which also involves a crazy person holding someone against their will in a basement. This isn't a terrible book (Ketchum is an excellent writer in general), but it just fell short in the character department. The Woman was alright because I knew her character from the previous two novels, but the family who kidnapped her weren't as fully formed as I'd like. I never got a clear reason WHY the father was insane and WHY THE HELL DID HIS WIFE OR DAUGHTER NOT RUN TO THE POLICE THE FIRST CHANCE THEY GOT?? I'm sorry, but if my husband or my dad told me that he had a wild woman chained up in the basement the last thing I'd do would be to stay in that house. The whole family just took the whole thing in stride. It was weird. 


I'd definitely recommend Off Season and Offspring, but maybe skip the third book in this trilogy as it doesn't really seem to add much to the story from the first two novels. 

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen (CBR-V #7)

Cannonball Read V: Book #7/52
Published: 2006
Pages: 362
Genre: Contemporary Fiction

4 stars: Very good. Would recommend.

I wasn't sure how I was going to like this book. It sounded interesting, but I was afraid it was going to be more of a romance than I care for. I am SO happy to say that I was totally wrong. It was mostly about the circus with some romance thrown in, but not overtaking the story. 

I loved the circus as a kid and remember the excitement when they started setting up the tent in the field next to the elementary school. We'd all stand and watch them during our recess. I even got to ride an elephant once! So that's what drew me to this book.  

The book starts with an old man named Jacob who is at a nursing home. A circus is setting up down the street and Jacob starts to reminisce about the summer of 1931 when he worked at the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. He was just about to graduate with his veterinary degree from Cornell when he finds out his parents were killed in a car accident. He walks out of his exams and hops a train that happens to house the Benzini Brothers circus. 

The back side of the circus industry back then was pretty dark. Animal abuse ran rampant and Jacob does his best to help once he his hired to be the circus veterinarian. The treatment of the employees was probably even worse than the animals because the animals brought in money. The gritty circus underworld and all of the circus characters were really interesting.

Then we have Marlena. If this romance was more front and center in the novel, I would have probably hated it. Marlena was pretty bland. She's married to the ringleader, August, and he's pretty much batshit crazy. Of course Jacob falls in love with her, blah, blah. It was a little eye-rolling at times, but didn't really detract from the rest of the story too much. 

Overall, I can see why this book was a bestseller and how it would appeal to a pretty broad audience.  

The Dead Zone by Stephen King (CBR-V #2)

Cannonball Read V: Book #2/52
Published: 1980
Pages: 402
Genre: Fiction/Thriller

I've read just about every Stephen King book that he's written, so now I'm reading some of the few that I never managed to pick up. Which means these are the ones I found least interesting when I read the blurbs on the back. The plot of The Dead Zone never really jumped out at me. It follows a man named John Smith (creative, huh?) as a 20-something with a nice girlfriend who gets into a bad car accident and ends up in a coma. He surprises everyone when he wakes up almost five years later. Of course by then everyone else has moved on. His girlfriend is now married to someone else and his mom lost it and started getting into some weird religious cults.

Johnny's changed too. He gets flashes of the future sometimes when he touches people or objects. Eventually the press hears about it and makes a huge deal and then eventually prints that he's a fraud. He tries to live a quiet life but he keeps freaking people out when he tries to help them after seeing a flash. He even helps solve a serial killer case that the police are baffled by. 

I thought the serial killer part would be more central to the story than it was. It was a fairly small part while most of the book was centered around a politician that Johnny shook hands with once and saw a flash of a future war. Sigh. I seem to be picking all the political books this month for some reason.

This definitely wasn't my favorite King book. It was okay (and probably good for people who like King's novels that are less "horror"), but pretty forgettable. 

The Casual Vacancy by J.K. Rowling (CBR-V #1)

Cannonball Read V: Book #1/52
Published: 2012
Pages: 503
Genre: Fiction

I think this book is best read by going into it without thinking that it was written by J.K. Rowling. I know it's been said to death, but this is definitely not Harry Potter. The Casual Vacancy starts off with the death of Barry Fairbrother. His death was sudden and now everyone is plotting to see who will get his seat on the town council. There's a lot of politics in this book, which is probably why I didn't like it as much as I wanted to.

It's actually a fairly solid book, but ultimately not really my type of book. The thing that saved it for me where the secret lives of the townspeople. I loved those parts and hated all the political scheming. I could have read an entire book just about Krystal's family. There were a lot of characters to wade though, but I really liked the younger kids the best. J.K. Rowling has a great way of writing children and adolescent characters and the kids in this book really showed that. Their stories were just so much more interesting than the adults (maybe because there were less politics with the kids?). 

Overall, it was a well-written book, but I'm not sure exactly who it should be marketed to. Most people probably like either one half or the other. 

Lunar Park by Bret Easton Ellis (CBR-IV #35)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #35/52
Published: 2005
Pages: 404
Genre: Fiction

Apparently this book wasn't very well received by most Bret Easton Ellis fans and I can see why. It's definitely different. I've only slightly familiar with Ellis' work, having read American Psycho back in college and The Informers just recently. Strangely, Lunar Park is probably my favorite of the three.

The book follows a very well-known author named Bret Ellis (sound familiar?) as we marries a famous actress and they move to the suburbs with their family (they have a son together and she has a daughter). The first half of the book is almost an autobiography of Ellis' career. I'm not super familiar with his real life history, so I'm not sure how much is true and how much was fictionalized for the story. The fiction Bret Ellis in the book also wrote American Psycho, Less than Zero, etc. 

The second half of the book is where everything gets kind of weird. I think this is where Ellis lost some of his audience. I went into this without having read most of his other novels, so it wasn't such a divergence to me for him to start writing about hauntings and such. I can see how that would be hard to swallow to a huge BEE fan. Kind of like if Stephen King started writing romance novels or something. 


Anyways, I liked this part of the book. It's definitely weird, but it was super creepy as well. The daughter's Ferby doll coming to life was creepy as heck. Those things always kind of disturbed me. The tension really built up as more and more weird things start happening and more mysteries pop up. Why does Bret's son seem to be involved in a bunch of teen disappearances? Why is there a serial killer replicating Patrick Bateman's murders from American Psycho? What the hell is going on with that creepy Furby?? 

I thought the book was great. It's a slow burning mystery, but definitely still a page-turner. I also liked the ending. It fit well without being cliche or some completely nuts twist ending. People generally wouldn't recommend Lunar Park as a first Ellis novel to try out, but I actually think it might work better if you're not a huge Ellis fan already. Maybe check out American Psycho first though so you have some background on Patrick Bateman.

The Informers by Bret Easton Ellis (CBR-IV #34)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #34/52
Published: 1994
Pages: 226
Genre: Short Stories/Fiction

First of all, I'm really glad I read that this was basically a collection of loosely connected short stories rather than a novel. Otherwise, I would have been really lost. 

I'm still trying to figure out if I like Bret Easton Ellis. I read American Psycho years ago and it still remains one of the only horror novels to ever make me sick enough to never want to read it again. And I read a lot of horror, so that's saying something. I finally decided to pick up another B.E.E. novel and somehow ended up with The Informers. 

This book is about rich people in L.A. Every story has a different twist (some are more extreme than others -- such as the vampire one), but they are all basically about drugged-up rich people. It was an interesting glimpse into the dark side of the rich and powerful, but the lack of plot was sometimes annoying. I'll probably try another full-length B.E.E. novel before I give up on him. 

The Cellar by Richard Laymon (CBR-IV #29)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #29/52
Published: 1980
Pages: 309
Genre: Horror


I'd heard good things about this book. So much so, that it seems to almost be a "classic" in the horror novel genre. Richard Laymon is pretty well known as a horror novelist as well, so I figured this would be a good place to start with my first Laymon book. I can now safely say that I probably will not be reading anymore Laymon books. 


This book was awful. Between the unlikeable characters and the unnecessary, stomach-churning depictions of child rape, I just couldn't believe how many people recommended this book. I was expecting a scary creature in the cellar type book. Well, there was a creature in the cellar (or sometimes in the attic, or the bedrooms, so I'm not quite sure why it wasn't just called "The House" or something). I'm still not quite sure what the heck this "creature" was. Was he an alien? A mutant human? Half animal? Science experiment gone wrong? I have no clue. It would have been nice to have some sort of background on this thing. 


But the creature only is half of the plot. The other half is about a woman and her 12-year-old daughter who are on the run from her ex-husband who was just released from prison. He was in prison for raping his daughter and now the reader is being punished by having to read a bunch of graphic scenes of him child-raping his way up the California coast to find his ex-wife and daughter. Ugh. I know it's a horror novel and horror novels don't always have likable characters, but my God, it would have been horrifying enough to allude to the child abuse instead of telling us every detail. 


These two plots are linked because the mom who is on the run ends up sleeping with some guy who is trying to kill the creature in the cellar of "Beast House". Oh yeah, Beast House is the house where the creature lives that the owners conduct tours of due to to all the murders that have happened there. I think Laymon was trying to write two different stories and came up with the most nonsensical way to link the two plots. There is no character development between the mom and her new lover (I can't even remember their names!). They just start sleeping with each other and when they are having sex THEY LEAVE HER DAUGHTER WITH THE GUY'S ADULT MALE FRIEND. Yes, she leaves her daughter WHO WAS RAPED BY HER FATHER with a strange, older male. Great parenting, lady. 


Anyways, I would not really recommend this book unless you're a sick person who needs some new pedophilia material, and even then it's probably not worth wading through the rest of the book for that. 

Story of a Girl by Sara Zarr (CBR-IV #28)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #28/52
Published: 2007
Pages: 192
Genre: Young Adult

Three years ago, Deanna was caught having sex in the backseat of a car by her dad. She was 13, the guy was her older brother's 17-year-old friend. Needless to say, her life quickly changed for the worse afterwards. Various stories of the incident went around her school calling her a slut, or desperate and pathetic. 

Three years later, Deanna's dad is still barely speaking to her and her brother is living in the basement with his girlfriend and their infant. Deanna's in love with her best friend who is dating her other friend. She gets a summer job at a run-down pizza place just to find out that Tommy (the guy she slept with) also works there. So, yeah, this isn't some fluffy YA book. There's no romance, just heartbreak. 

I was pleasantly surprised by this book. I like books with flawed characters. In my opinion, it's much harder to write a character like that than it is to write a bland or "perfect" main character. I would definitely recommend this book to teens as well as adults who are looking for a less fluffy YA book.

Blindness by Jose Saramago (CBR-IV #27)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #27/52
Published: 1995
Pages: 286
Genre: Dystopian

Blindness is an interesting novel. It starts out with a man who is suddenly struck blind while at a traffic light. A man helps him home (and steals his car), but he also is struck blind later. The original blind man goes to an eye doctor who can't make sense if it either. Then the eye doctor is struck blind. Everyone who is in contact with someone who is already blind is also struck by this odd "white blindess" where all they can see is bright white. 

The quick spread of the blindess causes the government to panic and try to quarantine everyone who is already blind. The "original" group of blind people are among the ones thrown in an old hospital (I think...maybe an asylum?) and sort of left to fend for themselves except for some sporadic and meager food deliveries. The military is outside the gates and shoots anyone who gets too close.

The book is a little hard to read if you have trouble with "train of thought" type writing. There aren't a lot of paragraphs and you have to just kind of figure out yourself when someone starts and stops speaking. There are also no formal names. People are known as "the girl with the dark glasses" and "the doctor's wife". It sort of gives you a sense of disorientation like the blind people, so in a way it works with this novel. 

Overall, I thought it was a good book. I liked the plot and it ended up being different than I thought it would be. There was no "hero". This was as gritty and as dirty as you can get in a dystopian novel. I found it to be fairly realistic as to how society would probably deal with this sort of crisis. No magical cure, no evil government secrets, etc. (can you tell I've read to many YA dystopian books?), just...grim reality. 

The Cement Garden by Ian McEwan (CBR-IV #26)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #26/52
Published: 1978
Pages: 160
Genre: Fiction


This was a weird book. Very weird. It follows three siblings after the death of both of their parents in a short time span. They actually put their dead mother in a trunk in the basement and fill it with concrete. I told you it was weird. They figure they can all stay together if no one knows their mother is dead.


However, it was well-written and gave a pretty clear picture of this family, especially considering how short it was. If you're not easily disturbed (and like weird), it's worth a quick read. 

The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel (CBR-IV #23)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #23/52
Published: 1980
Pages: 516
Genre: Historical Fiction


Jean M. Auel's Earth's Children series was apparently pretty popular back in the 80's and even spawned a notoriously bad movie in 1986. Having been written five years before I was born, I never heard of the series until a few years ago. I've had the first book on my to-read list for a quite a while, but just recently got around to it. I guess it took me a while to pick it up because it's not really the sort of novel I would normally read, but something in the premise must have struck my interest to buy it in the first place. 


The book follows a little girl named Ayla as she gets lost from her mother during an earthquake some 35,000 years ago. Auel shines in making the Ice Age world come to life, even though sometimes I felt that the literal pages and pages of plant descriptions might have been overkill. Ayla (who is five years old when she loses her mother), wanders around in the woods delirious from hunger and is almost killed by a cave lion before she is stumbled upon by a Neanderthal clan of people who call themselves The Clan of the Cave Bear. The Clan reluctantly decide to "adopt" her after their medicine woman develops an attachment to Ayla.


The book follows Ayla's struggle to fit in with the Clan's laws and customs as she grows up. She looks nothing like anyone in the Clan. She is tall, blonde, and regarded as ugly to the other Clan members.  Most of the Clan eventually accepts her, but there are a few who oppose her being part of the Clan since she is an "other". 


I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this book. It's not a subject I would normally read, but Auel is a gifted author who can tell a great story. I'm actually looking forward to picking up the next book in the series.

Survivor by Chuck Palahniuk (CBR-IV #18)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #18/52
Published: 1999
Pages: 289
Genre: Fiction


Chuck Palahniuk books are kind of hard to review. They are the closest thing I can imagine to being inside the mind of a crazy person. They always start out disjointed and then once you start piecing things together, they start to make a little more sense. But still -- mind of a crazy person. Survivor is more of the same formula. 

Basically, you're inside the mind of a crazy guy who used to be in a religious cult where most of the members killed themselves. He survived, but now he's hijacking a plane to commit suicide. Then the story goes backwards and tells us what happened between the cult and the hijacking. From there it's a just a scrambled mess of craziness.

I wanted to like this book. Kind of like I've wanted to like every Palahniuk book I've picked up since Fight Club. But I couldn't have cared less what happened to the guy in this book (I can't even remember his name for the life of me!). For such a short book, it shouldn't have been such a chore to read. It wasn't BAD -- Palahniuk is a very gifted writer -- but I wish he'd find a new schtick, because this one is getting kind of old. And it really pains me to say that.

We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver (CBR-IV #5)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #5/52
Published: 2011
Pages: 500 
Genre: Fiction


I have really mixed feelings about this book. I remember wanting to read it when it came out last year, but forgot about it until the movie version was just released. I prefer to read the book before I see the movie, so I decided to finally pick this one up.


We Need to Talk About Kevin is written from his mother, Eva's, point of view. She is writing letters to her estranged husband recounting a horrible event that their son Kevin was responsible for that she initially only refers to as Thursday (in italics). Slowly, the events are unfolded until we have the full scope of horrors that unfolded at Kevin's school on Thursday. 

And I do mean S.L.O.W.L.Y. Eva starts alllll the way back to her pregnancy with Kevin and recounts his entire life. This book drags and drags and drags for the first 300-400 pages. I almost put it down because it seemed to be going nowhere. However, if you can stick it out, I think it's highly worth finishing. The last part of the book was absolutely horrifying. I can't give away much without completely ruining the book for you, but I can tell you that this isn't a typical school shooting story that we've all heard over and over since Columbine. 

For one, Kevin is one of those kids that is terrifying. I don't have children, but I've heard stories (although rare) of people who have or adopt kids who are just pure sociopaths. They torture their siblings, they set their house on fire, etc. and have zero remorse. He's not the goth kid who writes heavy metal lyrics in his notebook at school. He's the silent, smart type who has almost NO distinct personality and no connection to anyone. The ones you should really be scared of. 

If you want to read a slow burning, chilling book, try this one. The ending is worth is and will stick with you for days. 

Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton (CBR-IV #4)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #4/52
Published: 1991
Pages: 480 (1,751 total pages this year)
Genre: Fiction/Thriller


I am terrified of dinosaurs. I frequently have nightmares where they take over my house and eat me. My friend convinced me to ride the Dinosaur ride at Disney World in college and I actually huddled in a ball on the floor of the ride sobbing. I fully blame my 3rd grade teacher for showing the class Jurassic Park in school. Hm...showing a freaking terrifying PG-13 movie to a bunch of 8-year-olds without parental permission? Yayyyyy public school in the 90s! Anyways, even though I was traumatized as a child, I now absolutely love Jurassic Park. 


I read the book sometime back in college and loved it. I'm one of those people who can read a book or watch a movie and immediately forgot almost everything about it except whether I liked it or hated it. Therefore I have no problems re-reading books because I generally have forgotten almost everything besides the basic plot. This irritates my husband to no end because it means I can watch a movie 400 times and not get tired of it. 


Okay, back to Jurassic Park (the book). I'm pretty sure everyone knows the plot -- crazy, rich, old man recreates dinosaurs from DNA to open a dino theme park. Things don't go as planned and the dinosaurs get out and eat people. Main characters include paleobotanist grad student Ellie Saddler, paleontologist Dr. Alan Grant, pre-hipster hipster mathematician Ian Malcolm, crazy old man's grandkids, Tim and Lex, and a few other minor characters. 

I really do love this book and think it's one of Crichton's best works (if not THE best). Tons of action and only minor bits of dry scientific crap (usually when Malcolm opens his mouth -- a shame since he was always my favorite in the movie). There is just a constant sense of fear and apprehension the whole time you're reading. The characters are really well done too. You actually get to know the characters and care whether or not they live or die. I've had issues with other Crichton books not having enough character development. And again, I love an author who has the balls to kill off main characters (the book  still has some surprises even if you've seen the movie).

Overall, this is one of those books I'll probably keep going back to every few years. It's a little campy, but a whole of lot of fun and excitement. Now I'm just going to sleep with my lights on for a week and hope I don't dream about a T-rex eating me through my bedroom window.

The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton (CBR-IV #2)

Cannonball Read IV: Book #2/52
Published: 1969
Pages: 327 (775 total pages this year)
Genre: Fiction/Thriller


I guess I'm on a Michael Crichton kick (I just started Congo). I've had this book for a while, but never picked it up. I love biological terror books (The Hot Zone, The Stand), but somehow never got around to reading The Andromeda Strain. I assumed it would be more like The Stand, with it being fictional and all, however, it was more scientifically driven like the non-fiction The Hot Zone.


Basically, the government has been sending satellites to outer space to bring back foreign organisms. They have a very elaborate plan in motion just in case a satellite brings back a biological disease that effects humans. It involves a small scientific team being summoned to a remote, high tech lab in the middle of a Nevada desert to figure out what they're dealing with. The plan (dubbed "Wildfire") goes into effect once a disease-carrying satellite crashes down into small Piedmont, Arizona, killing the entire 68-person population.


This is definitely not a character driven novel. It was almost purely scientifically driven with a few intense human scenes. It moved pretty quickly despite the sometimes dry scientific explanations, but I think it worked because it was on the shorter side. If this had been a brick like The Stand, there's no way anyone would get through the entire thing.


I hated the ending. HATED it. I can't even fathom why Crichton decided to end the book like that. I won't spoil it, but it was definitely a letdown and seemed to come out of nowhere. 


Overall, I'm glad I finally read it but I probably won't be keeping it in my book collection to read again.