Jeff Vandermeer’s trilogy (Area X) dealt with big themes like “what is real?” and “can their be more than one reality?” It also looked at human institutions like government agencies and research laboratories and how these things can morph from their original purposes.

Dan Chaon’s One of Us takes a more personal view. The story is set in a traveling carnival. This is a ripe area for fiction. On my bookshelf are Freakshow by Jacquin Sanders (1954), The Dreaming Jewels by Theodore Sturgeon (1950), and William Lindsay Gresham’s 1946 Nightmare Alley, made into two films (1947 and 2021) of the same name.

Stories about carnivals, circuses, and freakshows present us with outcasts—people on the margins of society. One of Us follows the misfortunes of a brother and sister who are orphaned young and then beset upon by a vicious relative. They are “rescued” by the carnival and their journey of self-discovery begins.

Chaon looks at the nature of relationships and their power dynamics. And he clearly has a soft spot for marginalized communities. What after all, makes us human? The characters in One of Us are too weird, too ugly, too bizarre, and too misshapen to have a chance in the regular world. And some of them have abilities that would terrify the “normies” and thus they have to be excluded from society.

The answer for them, of course, is to form their own society. Is this the answer for anyone who doesn’t “fit in?”

I certainly hope not. As nurturing as the carnival world is to its inhabitants, ultimately we all need to belong, and exclusion is not a recipe for a healthy civilization. Perhaps we outsiders, someday, will learn to see the beauty, uniqueness, and humanity of those in the closeted worlds we keep at arm’s length.

So, what are you reading?