Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Dysfunctional Families

Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
~Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

Mental illness. Drug abuse. Hoarding. Cheating. Family secrets. Destructive behavior. Adversity. Violence. There are a lot of factors that can cause families to malfunction or self-combust.  We've rounded up a list of memoirs by people, some famous and some not, who have grown up in dysfunctional families - how it impacted them, how they've coped, and the different ways they are living out their lives today.  Check it out!


Chanel Bonfire: A Memoir by Wendy Lawless

The Good Daughter: A Memoir of My Mother's Hidden Life by Jasmin Darznik

Handbook for an Unpredictable Life: How I Survived Sister Renata and My Crazy Mother, and Still Came Out Smiling (With Great Hair) by Rosie Perez

She Left Me the Gun: My Mother's Life Before Me by Emma Brockes

Dirty Secret: A Daughter Comes Clean About Her Mother's Compulsive Hoarding by Jessie Sholl

Her Last Death: A Memoir by Susanna Sonnenberg

Cocktail Hour Under the Tree of Forgetfulness by Alexandra Fuller

Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson

The Mistress's Daughter by A. M. Homes

The Liars' Club: A Memoir by Mary Karr

The Glass Castle: A Memoir by Jeannette Walls

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel

Rescuing Patty Hearst: Memories From a Decade Gone Mad by Virginia Holman

The Three of Us: A Family Story by Julia Blackburn

Lies My Mother Never Told Me: A Memoir by Kaylie Jones      

Mommy Dressing: A Love Story, After a Fashion by by Lois Gould

Circling My Mother by Mary Gordon

With or Without You: A Memoir by Domenica Ruta

What She Left Behind by Ellen Marie Wiseman

Astor Orphan: A Memoir by Alexandra Aldrich

Coming Clean by Kimberly Rae Miller  

Glitter and Glue: A Memoir by Kelly Corrigan 

Shocked: My Mother, Schiaparelli, and Me by Patricia Volk

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