By Katherine Dunn
368 pages; Vintage
Available at: Amazon.com | Barnes & Noble | iBookstore | IndieBound

This book is hard to explain to people. It's about a circus family. The heroine is a bald albino dwarf, and she's in love with her brother, who has no arms and performs in a fish tank. It's one of the most remarkably written, memorable, weird, disturbing books. I tell people that ultimately it's about a mother's love for her daughter.

— As told to Sara Nelson