Disfunctional families - fiction

[Deathraystare]

Any recommendations - fiction only please. Non of those real life misery books please!

Priestdaddy

It's not fiction - sorry - but from the 2 reviews I've read, it's not miserable at all.

Thanks I will look for it.

Colette Dartford might be a good one: An Unsuitable Marriage www.tripfiction.com/novel-set-in-somerset-uk/

Beaten to it by PaulSimons, got to be We Need To Talk About Kevin.

the corrections by jonathan franzten

non fiction mitford sisters by mary s lovell - such an interesting story you can't believe it's true!

Barbara Comyns's Sisters by a River. What a corking novel, and not very well known. Here is the description from a major online retailer:

On the banks of the River Avon, five sisters are born. The seasons come and go, the girls take their lessons under the ash tree, and always there is the sound of water swirling through the weir. Then, unexpectedly, an air of decay descends upon the house: ivy grows unchecked over the windows, angry shouts split the summer air, the milk sours in the larder and their father takes out his gun. Tragedy strikes the family, and before long the furniture is being auctioned off and the sisters dispersed among relatives. In her daring first novel, originally published in 1947, Barbara Comyns' unique young heroine relates the vivid, funny and bittersweet story of a childhood.

And if you are interested in the Mitfords Hons and Rebels by Jessica Mitford is essential reading.

Cold Comfort Farm . . . ?

The House We Grew Up In by Lisa Jewell - Disfunctional family with a mother who is a hoarder at the heart of the story. One of her best.

The Fifth Child - Doris Lessing

Thanks one and all! I have read the Kevin book and will look out the others. I meant to read the one about the Mitfords anyway.

Read Cold Comfort Farm too!

Cazalet chronicles are a pretty odd family.

Agree about Mitfords - Pursuit of Love etc

Glass Castle by Jeanette Walls - modern American dysfunction

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time springs to mind.

Rescue by Anita Shreve
A Spool of Blue Thread by Anne Tyler (many of hers are about dysfunctional families)
Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving

Seconding Niminy's recommendation of Barbara Comyns, she is a great writer.

I think that Wally Lamb can probably be included here - particularly 'I Know This Much Is True'.

I was going to say Anne Tyler too! The Patchwork Marriage being just one.

What about Adrian Mole? Isn't he a significant age this year?

The Corrections by Jonathan Frantzen. And Freedom is hardly happy families!

The relationship between mother and daughter in Jelinek's The Piano Teacher is pretty much the definition of dysfunctional.

Behind the Scenes at the Museum - Kate Atkinson

Running With Scissors - Augusten Burroughs

The Hiding Place by Trezza Azzopardi.

Highly recommended.