Quiz: What Family Drama Should You Read Next?

This sprawling multigenerational epic follows a Syrian Lebanese American family as they navigate love, parenthood, career, immigration, trauma, and the legacies of war and displacement. It features complicated sibling relationships, multiple timelines, gorgeous writing, and a hopeful ending.

When Patrick’s sister-in-law dies, and his brother checks himself into rehab, it falls on Patrick to take care of his niece and nephew for the summer. He’s been keeping to himself since his boyfriend died years before, but suddenly being a full-time caregiver draws him out of his shell, and reminds him it’s never too late to start over. Though it does deal with grief, it’s mostly funny, breezy, and lighthearted.

In a not-too-distant future, brain implants called Pilots, designed to increase focus and productivity, have become commonplace. Val and Julie and their two kids all have different opinions about Pilots, and soon all four of them are caught up in the complicated politics surrounding the new technology. It’s a beautiful blend of thought-provoking sci-fi and quiet family drama.

This eerie, haunting novel is about a Cherokee family in Oklahoma mourning the murder of their son and brother Ray-Ray years before. Told through a chorus of POVs in the weeks leading up to the anniversary of Ray-Ray’s death, it’s a beautiful, devastating book about ghosts, ancestors, grief, and the history of the Cherokee people.

This YA retelling of Snow White centers two women. Mina, whose heart is made of glass, escaped her evil magician father to become a queen. Her stepdaughter Lynet is a girl created out of snow in the image of her dead mother. It’s a lush fantasy about mother-daughter relationships and the families we create.

This gorgeous epic is about a Hawaiian family whose lives are changed forever when their son Nainoa develops strange healing powers. Told in four distinct POVs, the story unfolds over a decade as Nianoa, his siblings, and their parents struggle to make lives for themselves amidst economic collapse. Washburn weaves elements of Hawaiian mythology into this deeply human story about familial expectations, first love, addiction, siblinghood, history, and so much more.

At 816 pages, this book is a commitment! It’s worth it, though. Jeffers tells the story of one Black American family across several centuries, from slavery through the present day. Weaving together multiple timeliness and many POVs, it’s a sprawling book with an epic feel, made up of detailed, intimate stories about the everyday lives of several generations of Black women .

At just under 200 pages, it’s staggering how much emotion Engel packs into this often harrowing but ultimately uplifting novel. It’s about a Colombian family whose lives are continually upended by deportation and the unending injustices of the U.S. immigration system. Engel writes about the horrors her characters endure without sensationalizing them; it’s just as much about messy family dynamics as it is about the experiences of undocumented immigrants.

You should read A Place for Us by Fatima Farheen Mirza. This kaleidoscopic novel is about an Indian American Muslim family, gathered together for the first time in years for the wedding of their eldest daughter. The narrative moves back and forth in time, exploring the complex web of decisions, mistakes, and moments that have defined the messy relationships between three siblings and their parents. It’s a hefty book about religion, culture, generational difference, and identity.

Infused with magic and haunted by ghosts, this book is a reinvention of the intergenerational epic, a brilliant novel about a Southern Black family and everything they carry from one generation to the next: stories, wisdom, pain, memory.