Imaginary

Fictional Narratives

Novels and stories:

• Jokha Alharthi, Celestial Bodies: A Novel (Catapult, 2019): “These vignettes are sharp-eyed, sharp-edged and carefully deployed in a multigenerational jigsaw that’s as evasive as it is evocative.”
• Amanda Eyre Ward, The Jetsetters: A Novel (Ballantine Books, 2020): “Charlotte Perkins, a widow in her early 70s, wins a contest for a Mediterranean cruise, and invites her adult children to come along. Behavior is atrocious. Family secrets are exposed. Reckonings and reconciliations are had.”
• Anne Enright, Actress: A Novel (W.W. Norton, 2020): “An Actress Descends Into Madness, and Her Daughter Picks Up the Pieces”
• Liane Moriarty, Apples Never Fall: A Novel (Henry Holt & Co., 2021): “. . . a wifty tale of domestic suspense, and a satisfying, layered family drama where the tension comes from the treachery of memory, the specter of generational violence and the effects of decades’ worth of unspoken resentments that have curdled over time.”
• Mirian Toews, Fight Night: A Novel (Bloomsbury, 2021): “The reader is pulled into the intimacy of a dysfunctional family whose unconditional love would make any truly dysfunctional family jealous. The three women stand alone, together, against the universe, so closely molded against one another’s jagged edges that their individual outlines blur.”
• David Guterson, The Final Case: A Novel (Alfred A. Knopf, 2022): “In this novel, Guterson is not really writing about who done it, or even why. His subject is family love, and its silent passions grip the reader like a steady, racing current.”
• Monica Ali, Love Marriage: A Novel (Scribner, 2022): “Monica Ali explores the ripple effect of one union on two households with deep secrets.”
• Joseph Han, Nuclear Family: A Novel (Counterpoint, 2022), “is . . . focused on fallout — from war, from family obligation, from all that goes unsaid — and what it takes to move forward after a disaster.”
• Eleanor Brown, Any Other Family: A Novel (G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2022): “. . . Eleanor Brown shows how nonstop togetherness can lead to tension, injury and, occasionally, joy.”
• Katie Hafner, The Boys: A Novel (Spiegel & Grau, 2022), “begins with a letter from a bike touring company, asking the main character not to sign up for another trip.”
• Oscar Hokeah, Calling for a Blanket Dance: A Novel (Algonquin Books, 2022): “At the heart of 'Calling for a Blanket Dance' is a profound reflection on the intergenerational nature of cultural trauma. Hokeah’s characters exist at the intersection of Kiowa, Cherokee and Mexican identity, which provides a vital exploration of indigeneity in contemporary American letters.”
• J.M. Lee, Broken Summer: A Novel (Amazon Crossing, 2022): “The second mystery lies deep inside Hanjo’s marriage, which seems to be crumbling around him as the past rears up to meet the present. ‘Your life?’ his wife responds, when he asks why she seems determined to ruin him. ‘Come off it. It was my life. I was your maidservant, lover, nanny and stand-in. So you’re nothing without me.’ How painful for Hanjo, to be forced finally to listen to what she has to say.”
• Jean Hanff Korelitz, The Latecomer: A Novel (Celadon Books, 2022): “The Siblings in This Book Loathe Each Other, and It’s So Refreshing . . . Jean Hanff Korelitz takes on complicated family dynamics, infidelity, race, class, religion, guilt, art and real estate.”
• Catherine Steadman, The Family Game: A Novel (Ballantine Books, 2022): “Harriet, a.k.a. Harry, the narrator, has just announced her engagement to the preternaturally rich and charming Edward Holbeck. But surely there’s a better way for her to get to know his relatives than through their annual ‘Krampusnacht’ tradition, which entails being stalked in the dark by a grotesquely hairy, seven-foot-tall homunculus dripping with blood and saliva?”
• Asale Angel-Ajani, A Country You Can Leave: A Novel (MCD/Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2023): “. . . the American-born biracial daughter of a Russian immigrant, wants two things: for her mother, the erudite yet scrappy Yevgenia, to finally see her, and for her mother to leave her alone.”
• Donal Ryan, The Queen of Dirt Island: A Novel (Viking, 2023), “follows an Irish family through several tumultuous decades.”
• Richard Mirabella, Brother & Sister Enter the Forest: A Novel (Catapult, 2023): “. . . the sudden reunion of estranged siblings leads to an overdue reckoning with past trauma.”
• Hila Blum, How to Love Your Daughter: A Novel (Riverhead Books, 2023): “For six years, Leah has made sporadic calls to her mother from around the world . . . She is trekking up mountains, sleeping in forests, visiting distant villages. Except Leah has actually been living in the Netherlands all that time, with the husband and daughters she has never once mentioned to her mother, and her nomadic life was a fabrication.”
• Cormac James, Trondheim: A Novel (Bellevue Literary Press, 2024) “explores the terrible dread and peculiar quality of watching over a loved one in the hospital.”
• Rebecca Kaufman, I’ll Come to You: A Novel (Counterpoint, LLC, 2025): “The ‘Corrections’-esque pressure of one last Christmas might herald only the hard truths of family togetherness — and Kauffman does provide, with exquisite precision, all the toxic snits, the petty furies, the lure of nostalgia, the gnaw of needs never met. But she insists, too, on granting each character, siloed though they may be, their share of wins.”

Horror novels, on the “Haunting Power of Family”:

• Natalia Theodoridou, Sour Cherry: A Novel (Tin House, 2025): “The story begins with Agnes, a woman hired as a wet nurse by a wealthy family after the death of her own son. After ‘the boy,’ as Agnes calls him, or ‘the little lord,’ grows up and stops breastfeeding, Agnes stays on as caretaker of the quiet, mysterious child. Eventually, the narrative switches focus from Agnes to the little lord and his wife before changing again to chronicle the life of Tristan, the little lord’s own son.”
• Kylie Lee Baker, Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng: A Darkly Funny, Gory, and Ghostly Horror Novel (Mira, 2025): “It’s a fun novel about three friends hunting for ghosts, cracking jokes and eating dumplings. It’s also a dark and uncomfortable read about heartache, racism and thinking you’re no more than the ‘echo of a dead person.’”
• Ingvild Bjerkeland, Beasts: A Novel (Levine Querido, 2025): “The story takes place amid calamity — big hairy monsters with large claws showed up and ended civilization as we know it. Thirteen-year-old Abdi and his little sister, Alva, were with their mom when the beasts emerged; their dad was away on a work trip. When the monsters kill their mother, Abdi and Alva set out to reunite with their father. But a world full of monsters is no place for two kids traveling alone.”

Poetry

Books of poems:

• Kevin Young, Stones: Poems (Knopf, 2021), “about family, about death and about how families absorb and repurpose loss; the stones here bear names and life spans.”

Music: Composers, artists, and major works

The Carter Family was the name taken by the early country music group consisting of A.P. Carter, Sara Dougherty Carter and their daughter Maybelle Addington Carter. Their recordings are iconic in the field. These are not classically trained musicians but their performances evoke how a singing family with no special musical talent might aspire to sound. 

Richard Strauss, Symphonia Domestica (Sinfonia Domestica), tone poem for orchestra, Op. 53, TrV 209 (1902) (approx. 45’): “Fairy tales often end with the wedding of two lovers and the phrase ‘happily ever after.’ We who live in the real world, however, sometimes wonder what happens after the fairy tale has ended and the hero and heroine have settled down to make a home, have children, and (we hope) lead an exemplary life.” “The Symphonia Domestica is a multi-movement symphony in six continuous and motivically interlaced movements, which describes a twenty-four hour life-cycle in the Strauss famille.” Strauss explained what the work was about: “A day in my family life. It will be partly lyrical, partly humorous – a triple fugue will together portray papa, mama, and baby. . . What can be more serious than family life? I want the Symphonia domestica to be understood seriously.” Top recorded performances are by Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra (Furtwängler) in 1944; Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra (Strauss) in 1944; Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra (Krauss) in 1951; Chicago Symphony Orchestra (Reiner) in 1956; Cleveland Orchestra (Szell) in 1964; Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra (Mehta) in 1968; Staatskapelle Dresden (Kempe) in 1972; Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra (Karajan) in 1973 ***; Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich (Zinman) in 2002, and SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg (Roth) in 2014. 

Other compositions:

• Ingolf Dahl, Music for Brass Instruments (1944) (approx. 15’) 

Albums:

• Balimaya Project, “Wolo So” (2021) (46’): “Balimaya” means “essence of kinship” in Maninka.
• Muhal Richard Abrams, “Familytalk” (1992) (70’): “Trumpeter Jack Walrath, Patience Higgins (on tenor, bass clarinet, and English horn), bassist Brad Jones, drummer Reggie Nicholson (who also plays marimba and bells), Warren Smith (vibes, timpani, marimba, and gongs), and Abrams (on piano and synthesizer) all have their spots to interact, and the wide variety of colors that Abrams achieves from this instrumentation is always unpredictable.”
• Robert Plant & Alison Krauss, “Raising Sand” (2007) (57’)
• Willie Nelson, “Red Headed Stranger” (1974) (34’) is an album about a lost love, his wife.
• Radical Face, “The Family Tree: The Roots” (2010) (46’), “The Family Tree: The Branches” (2013) (45’), and “The Family Tree: The Leaves” (2016) (41’): “The Family Tree series is a four album set, written and recorded over an eight year period. Each album covers a generation of a semi-fictional family, The Northcotes, becoming increasingly modern in production and song-writing styles with each volume. Inspired by multi-generational family novels, such as ‘East of Eden’ and ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’, I wanted to try my hand at the concept in album form . . .” (The artist seems to have miscounted the number of albums.)
• Nick Drake, “Family Tree” (2007) (66’): “This 28-track collection of lo-fi home recordings-- many of which have been available on bootlegs for years-- was produced on a reel-to-reel at Drake's parent's estate, recorded on cassette while Drake was studying in Aix En Provence, France, or made in conjunction with other members of the late singer-songwriter's family.”
• Noah Gunderson, “Family” (2010) (27’): “. . . Gundersen pays homage to the people who have shaped his life in perfect and compelling songs full of emotion.”
• Amos Lee, “Mountains of Sorrow, Rivers of Song” (2013) (49’): “. . . there are times, when Lee seems to let go and say what’s on his mind without cloaking his thoughts in shrouded terms. The best example of this can be found when Lee sings, 'And next time you go downtown to fuck that asshole / Do one last thing for me / Don’t park your car down on Charles Street' . . .”
• LeAnn Rimes, “Family” (2007) (57’): “As co-writer of each of the album’s 12 proper tracks, she’s given the collection . . . focus and thematic coherence . . .”

Albums, in the family:

• Slava & Leonard Grigoryan, and Joseph & James Tawadros, “Band of Brothers”
• The Vaughan Brothers, “Family Style” (1989) (41’): the artists are Stevie Ray Vaughan and his brother Jimmie Vaughan.

Music: songs and other short pieces

• Sly & The Family Stone, “It’s a Family Affair” (lyrics)
• Lonestar, “My Front Porch Looking In” (lyrics)
• Reba McEntire, “My Sister” (lyrics)
• Guns N' Roses, "Sweet Child o' Mine" (lyrics)
• Luther Vandross, "Dance with My Father" (lyrics)

Visual Arts

• Salvador Dali, Reading. Family Scene by Lamplight (1981)
• Marc Chagall, Fisherman's Family (1968)
• Pablo Picassso, Family (1965)
• Norman Rockwell, A Family Tree (1959)
• Paul Klee, Siblings (1930)
• Egon Schiele, The Family (1918)
• Boris Kustodiev, At Home (1914-18)
• Pavel Filonov, Peasant Family (1910)
• Pablo Picasso, Harlequin's Family (1905)
• Paul Gauguin, Tahitian Woman and Two Children (1901)
• Mary Cassatt, The Family (1893)
• Eduoard Manet, The Monet Family in Their Garden at Argenteuil (1874)
• Lawrence Alma-Tadema Roman Family (1868)
• Jean-Honore Fragonard, The Italian Family (1759)
• Antoine Watteau, The Mezzetin's Family (1717)
• Rembrandt van Rijn, Family Group (1666-68)
• Rembrandt van Rijn, The Holy Family Night
• Jacob Jordaens, Self-Portrait Among Parents, Brothers and Sisters (c. 1615)

Film and Stage

• Wild Bill: an ex-convict eventually comes to value his teenage sons