Best books … chosen by Chandra Prasad

Chandra Prasad’s widely praised first novel, On Borrowed Wings, is now available in paperback. She is also the editor of Mixed, a Norton anthology of short fiction by multiracial authors.

A Separate Peace by John Knowles (Scribner, $11). In this poignant classic, every sentence counts. Cast as a simple story about a boy on the brink of manhood, the novel is really about a nation about to be torn apart by war.

Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang by Joyce Carol Oates (Penguin, $15). I go back and study this novel all the time because of its unusual style. Foxfire reads like rock music: sonic and thunderous in places; a slow, lingering ballad in others. The sentences almost literally harmonize with one another.

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