Thanksgiving Day 2010: 19 Dysfunctional Families In Books (PHOTOS)

Dreading going home for the holidays?

So are a lot of people. Last year we compiled a list of writers whose real families we thought must be nuttier than yours. This year, we expanded a little by including some of the craziest, most dysfunctional families in all types of books.

Here are is a list of books, from memoir to fiction, that might make you feel better about your family, because it definitely is not as crazy as those in these books.

Here's our list of dysfunctional family literary gems. What are your favorite books featuring dysfunctional families?

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Water For Elephants

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by Sara Gruen

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by Sara Gruen

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Total comments: 40 | Post a Comment

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This Family

Rank #2  |  Average: 4

Normal NUTS!

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Comments

[jack7521]

07:41 PM on 12/09/2010

I nominate "Bee Season" for complete dysfunction and any of the Spellman books for a good laugh.

Plus anything written by John Irving.

[lovemyluggage]

07:36 PM on 11/27/2010

Geek Love, by.....the person who wrote Geek Love.....wins my vote for most dysfunctional family in literature. For those listed above, I agree with the other comments who say HuffPo's list is actually full of pretty normal families.

Or perhaps my family's too dysfunctional for fiction.

[Carrie Anne King]

03:44 AM on 11/27/2010

Ha ha ha! Great dysfunctional family book list! I can think of a few more books that would qualify.

[ArtsyJane]

09:18 PM on 11/26/2010

How do we know they're more dysfunctional? They strike me most as the typical American families.

[ESerafina42]

09:43 AM on 11/25/2010

How about Harry Potter's relatives? They may pale in comparison to some of these, but I wouldn't know since I've never read most of them and there's NO CLUE to what they're about.

[ESerafina42]

09:37 AM on 11/25/2010

For about the tenth time, would it be so hard to add a little blurb for those of us who haven't read every single book but might be interested?????

[wackette]

07:14 PM on 11/26/2010

I was thinking the exact same thing!

[Remendado]

04:29 AM on 11/27/2010

Me too, but we will just have to make that extra effort and search for them at amazon to find out more about them.

[Ever12]

01:29 PM on 11/27/2010

for real. some interesting titles but what is it about? someone must know for selecting them.

[fishnetdiver]

05:43 AM on 11/25/2010

'The Hotel New Hampshire' by John Irving. quite the family...not really 'dysfunctional' per se but not really 'normal' either.
and ANY book about Robert Crumb's life...

[napasonoma]

02:25 AM on 11/25/2010

Kitty Kelley's The Family (Bush Clan)

[Kambriel2]

12:10 AM on 11/25/2010

I can't believe you guys left out I, Claudius. That family was so dysfunctional that they poisoned members on a regular basis. It made me think of my own family in a much better light.

[mlaiuppa]

01:16 AM on 11/25/2010

Absolutely.

And any book about Henry VIII.

[ESerafina42]

09:47 AM on 11/25/2010

Well, the English royal family at pretty much any time in history, but some other real stars are

1) Henry II, his wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine, whom he imprisoned for rebelling against him and encouraging their children, and the children themselves, who were at each other's and their father's throats;

2) the Plantagents throughout the fifteenth century (Wars of the Roses);

3) the Hanoverians (George I through Victoria), pretty much all of whom couldn't stand their eldest sons, and the feeling was mutual.

[triplettam]

12:03 AM on 11/25/2010

I don't know about Oedipus being in a dysfunctional family. Certainly unlucky and cursed by the Gods. But until all is revealed, they weren't nuts or anything.

[ESerafina42]

09:51 AM on 11/25/2010

Of course, if his father hadn't had him left on a mountainside to die because of that prophecy, everything else wouldn't have happened, though there's an assumption that it would have happened anyway in some other way. And Jocasta rushed into a second marriage (with a much younger man) pretty quickly after hubby #1 was murdered, though that may have been due to her vulnerable position as a wealthy widow, probably fair game for any powerful man who wanted her and her property.

[norsegirl]

11:18 PM on 11/24/2010

You forgot The Corrections. Hated that book.

[Ever12]

01:28 PM on 11/27/2010

It's there. I despised the sister-in-law who was best buddies to her sons. Skipped thru a lot of the book but the first few pages were really funny. The rest -- unreadable.

[benjycompson]

02:46 PM on 11/24/2010

Then what about the most dysfunctional family of all time the human one as portrayed in the Bible? Cain and Able are far worst than some bickering.

[ESerafina42]

09:40 AM on 11/25/2010

And Abraham's familiy - Isaac and Ishmael, Esau and Jacob, Jacob and his four wives/concubines (take that, Christians who say marriage has *always* been between one man and one woman!), Joseph and his brothers. Surely a lot of us have been tempted to sell one of our siblings to the gypsies (or whoever), but how many of us have actually *done* it?

[benjycompson]

02:45 PM on 11/24/2010

What: No Snopes, No Compson, No Beauchamps, No Bundren, No Sutpens, No Sartorises, No Griersons, and No Joe Christmas and his grandparents.

What about East of Eden?

[UDKM2010]

01:58 PM on 11/24/2010

We just don't talk about. So it doesn't exist.

[Remendado]

04:31 AM on 11/27/2010

Sounds like we come from similar families!

[powerhuff]

01:38 PM on 11/24/2010

this just in,