Books like 'Family'
Readers who enjoyed Family by Ba Jin also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
historical 20th century classics historical-fiction university literary-fiction family drama
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The Fortress by Meša Selimović
Rated: 4.67 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA novel on 18th century Sarajevo under Ottoman rule, featuring a soldier returned from the wars. A Muslim, he marries a Christian girl who supports him while he dabbles in politics, eventually leading a raid to rescue a friend from jail... -
![O Continente - Volume I by Erico Verissimo]()
O Continente - Volume I by Erico Verissimo
Rated: 4.57 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA vast sprawling period novel of the minor wars that wracked Brazil from the days when its European masters gambled with their colonists' affairs to the Civil Wars which turned family against family and set Republicans and Federalists at each others throats. Backgrounded by these wars, the story follows the history of the Terra-Cambaras, during 150 years, in the southern part of Brazil. The men . -
![Shipyard Girls in Love by Nancy Revell]()
Shipyard Girls in Love by Nancy Revell
Rated: 4.58 of 5 stars · 12 ratings'the author is one to watch' Sun'A riveting read is just what this is in more ways than one.' The Northern Echo'I enjoyed The Shipyard Girls very much indeed . . -
![Selected Stories of Anton Chekhov by Anton Chekhov]()
Selected Stories of Anton Chekhov by Anton Chekhov
Rated: 4.37 of 5 stars · 41 ratingsRichard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky, the highly acclaimed translators of War and Peace, Doctor Zhivago, and Anna Karenina, which was an Oprah Book Club pick and million-copy bestseller, bring their unmatched talents to The Selected Stories of Anton Chekhov, a collection of thirty of Chekhov’s best tales from the major periods of his creative life...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult anthologies -
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![Shipyard Girls at War by Nancy Revell]()
Shipyard Girls at War by Nancy Revell
Rated: 4.50 of 5 stars · 12 ratings1941: It takes strength to work on the docks, but the war demands all hands on deck and the women are doing their best to fill the gap. Rosie is flourishing in her role as head-welder while still keeping her double life a secret. But a dashing detective is forcing Rosie to choose between love and her duty... -
![Żelazny kaganek by Димитър Талев]()
Żelazny kaganek by Димитър Талев
Rated: 4.37 of 5 stars · 19 ratingsPowieść przedstawia losy macedońskiego rodu Głauszewów. Akcja powieści rozpoczyna się w połowie lat 30. XIX w. Stojan Głauszew, zabiwszy psa, który należał do lokalnego wielmoży tureckiego, w obawie przed jego gniewem decyduje się na ucieczkę ze wsi. Osiada w pobliskim mieście Prespa, gdzie poznaje Sułtanę, kobietę zaradną, silną i energiczną...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult audiobook book -
![Short Stories by Anton Chekhov]()
Short Stories by Anton Chekhov
Rated: 4.38 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe thirty-four stories in this volume span Chekhov's creative career. They present a wide spectrum of comic and serious themes and a variety of techniques. (His short novels, available in another Norton volume, Seven Short Novels by Chekhov, have been omitted... -
![The Last Leaf by O. Henry]()
The Last Leaf by O. Henry
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsSue and Johnsy are two girlfriends who live together in New York City. When Johnsy becomes sick one winter, she makes up her mind to die when the last leaf falls from the ivy plant growing outside her window. Sue would do anything to help her friend get well, but she is a poor artist. As the winter wind blows and the rain falls, there seems no way to stop the last leaf from falling...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century anthologies audiobook -
![The Complete Poems and Plays, 1909-1950 by T.S. Eliot]()
The Complete Poems and Plays, 1909-1950 by T.S. Eliot
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThis omnibus collection includes all of the author’s early poetry as well as the Four Quartets, Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, and the plays Murder in the Cathedral, The Family Reunion, and The Cocktail Party... -
![Life in the Tomb by Stratis Myrivilis, Στρατής Μυριβήλης]()
Life in the Tomb by Stratis Myrivilis, Στρατής Μυριβήλης
Rated: 4.42 of 5 stars · 12 ratings"Life in the Tomb" a war novel written in journal form by a sergeant in the trenches, has been the single most successful and widely read serious work of fiction in Greece since its publication in serial form in 1923-1924, having sold more than 80,000 copies in book form despite its inclusion on the list of censored novels under both the Metaxas regime and the German occupation... -
![Kinfolk by Pearl S. Buck]()
Kinfolk by Pearl S. Buck
Rated: 4.36 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsKinfolk is the story of a Chinese family. Dr. Liang moves to America in search of a better life, but his children long to return to China. Each responds to their new life in China differently, providing rich insight into the struggles between Eastern and Western culture, and the differences between generations...Categorized as:
historical-fiction classics family literary-fiction fiction historical 20th-century politics -
![A Country Doctor’s Notebook by Mikhail Bulgakov]()
A Country Doctor’s Notebook by Mikhail Bulgakov
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsBrilliant stories that show the growth of a novelist's mind, and the raw material that fed the wild surrealism of Bulgakov's later fiction.With the ink still wet on his diploma, the twenty-five-year-old Dr. Mikhail Bulgakov was flung into the depths of rural Russia which, in 1916-17, was still largely unaffected by such novelties as the motor car, the telephone or electric light...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult anthologies -
![Body and Soul by Frank Conroy]()
Body and Soul by Frank Conroy
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsIn the dim light of a basement apartment, six-year-old Claude Rawlings sits at an old white piano, picking out the sounds he has heard on the radio and shutting out the reality of his lonely world.The setting is 1940s New York, a city that is "long gone, replaced by another city of the same name...Categorized as:
classics drama family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century book coming-of-age -
![The Settlers by Vilhelm Moberg]()
The Settlers by Vilhelm Moberg
Rated: 4.31 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsConsidered one of Sweden's greatest 20th-century writers, Vilhelm Moberg created Karl Oskar and Kristina Nilsson to portray the joys and tragedies of daily life for early Swedish pioneers in America. His consistently faithful depiction of these humble people's lives is a major strength of the Emigrant Novels...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult audiobook book -
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![Collected Short Stories: Volume 2 by W. Somerset Maugham]()
Collected Short Stories: Volume 2 by W. Somerset Maugham
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThis final classic collection reveals Somerset Maugham's unique talent for exposing and exploring the bitter realities of human relationships in tales of love, infidelity, passion and prejudice. The stories range from "The Lotus Eater" where a man envisions a life of bliss in the Mediterranean, to the astringent tales of "The Outstation" and "The Back of Beyond" in Malaya and South East Asia...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies fiction historical -
![They Were Sisters by Dorothy Whipple]()
They Were Sisters by Dorothy Whipple
Rated: 4.33 of 5 stars · 12 ratings'They Were Sisters is a compulsively readable but often harrowing novel by one of Persephone's best writers, who always manages to make the ordinary extraordinary,' writes Celia Brayfield. This, the second Dorothy Whipple novel we have republished as a Classic, is, like the others, apparently gentle but it has a very strong theme, in this case domestic violence...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction family fiction historical female-author marriage -
![Kam Sukhun Yusuf by Sabahattin Ali]()
Kam Sukhun Yusuf by Sabahattin Ali
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 24 ratings...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult audiobook book -
![Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky by Patrick Hamilton]()
Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky by Patrick Hamilton
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsA timeless classic of sleazy London life in the 1930s, a world of streets full of cruelty and kindness, comedy and pathos, where people emerge from cheap lodgings in Pimlico to pour out their passions, hopes and despair in pubs and bars... -
![Hatter's Castle by A.J. Cronin]()
Hatter's Castle by A.J. Cronin
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsHatter's Castle (1931) is the first novel of author A. J. Cronin. The story is set in 1879, in the fictional town of Levenford, on the Firth of Clyde. The plot revolves around many characters and has many subplots, all of which relate to the life of the hatter, James Brodie, whose narcissism and cruelty gradually destroy his family and life... -
![Tumbling by Diane McKinney-Whetstone]()
Tumbling by Diane McKinney-Whetstone
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsDiane McKinney-Whetstone's lyrical first novel, Tumbling, vividly captures a tightly knit African-American neighborhood in South Philadelphia during the forties and fifties. Its central characters, Herbie and Noon, are a loving but unconventional couple whose marriage remains unconsummated for many years as Noon struggles to repossess her sexuality after a brutal attack in her past...Categorized as:
classics drama family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult audiobook -
![Tuareg by Alberto Vázquez-Figueroa]()
Tuareg by Alberto Vázquez-Figueroa
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsThe Tuaregs are the true sons of the desert. They can survive in the harshest of conditions like nobody else. The noble inmouchar Gacel Sayah, is the master of a large extension of the desert. One day, two fugitives arrive from the north and Gacel, following his ancient and sacred hospitality laws, gives them shelter...Categorized as:
drama historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult book fiction -
![The Lady With the Little Dog and Other Stories, 1896-1904 by Anton Chekhov]()
The Lady With the Little Dog and Other Stories, 1896-1904 by Anton Chekhov
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsIn the final years of his prominent life, Chekhov had reached the height of his powers as a dramatist, and also produced some of the stories that rank among his masterpieces. The poignant 'The Lady with the Little Dog' and 'About Love' examine the nature of love outside of marriage - its romantic idealism and the fear of disillusionment...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult anthologies audiobook -
![The Short Stories by Ernest Hemingway]()
The Short Stories by Ernest Hemingway
Rated: 4.22 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe definitive short story collection that established Ernest Hemingway's literary reputation, originally published in 1938.Ernest Hemingway is a cultural icon—an archetype of rugged masculinity, a romantic ideal of the intellectual in perpetual exile—but, to his countless readers, Hemingway remains a literary force much greater than his image...Categorized as:
classics drama literary-fiction university 20th-century action-adventure adult anthologies -
![The Plays of Anton Chekhov by Anton Chekhov]()
The Plays of Anton Chekhov by Anton Chekhov
Rated: 4.29 of 5 stars · 27 ratingsEnglish translations of Chekhov's classic plays by a Russian-language scholar who is also a veteran Chekhovian actor... -
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![Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family by Thomas Mann]()
Buddenbrooks: The Decline of a Family by Thomas Mann
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsBuddenbrooks, first published in Germany in 1901, when Mann was only twenty-six, has become a classic of modern literature.It is the story of four generations of a wealthy bourgeois family in northern Germany facing the advent of modernity; in an uncertain new world, the family’s bonds and traditions begin to disintegrate...Categorized as:
classics drama family historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult -
![The Traveller's Daughter by Michelle Vernal]()
The Traveller's Daughter by Michelle Vernal
Rated: 4.30 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsROSA’S PAST IS HER PANDORA’S BOX, AND THE LID IS ABOUT TO BE LIFTED … ‘If you lie down with dogs you’ll rise with fleas’ – Irish Proverb Rosa Sorenson’s conversation was often peppered with sayings from her homeland. It was these conversational clangers that gave her daughter Kitty the only clue as to a childhood her mother refused to speak of...Categorized as:
family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult book female-mc fiction -
![Of Time and the River: A Legend of Man's Hunger in His Youth by Thomas Wolfe]()
Of Time and the River: A Legend of Man's Hunger in His Youth by Thomas Wolfe
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThe sequel to Thomas Wolfe's remarkable first novel, Look Homeward, Angel, Of Time and the River is one of the great classics of American literature. The book chronicles the maturing of Wolfe's autobiographical character, Eugene Gant, in his desperate search for fulfillment, making his way from small-town North Carolina to the wider world of Harvard University, New York City, and Europe... -
![Assassins by Stephen Sondheim, John Weidman]()
Assassins by Stephen Sondheim, John Weidman
Rated: 4.21 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsEvoking a fraternity of political assassins and would-be assassins across a hundred years of our history, Sondheim and Weidman daringly examine success, failure and the questionable drive for power and celebrity in American society. "Dark, demented humor, as horrifying as it is hilarious... -
![Women & Children First by Gill Paul]()
Women & Children First by Gill Paul
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsShe was the most magnificent ship ever built, yet on the eve of 14th April the Titanic sank in the North Atlantic, leaving the lucky ones floating in wooden rowing boats, and the rest struggling for their lives in the icy water...Categorized as:
drama family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult alternate-history book -
![The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Volume 2: The Romantic Period through the Twentieth Century by M.H. Abrams, Stephen Greenblatt]()
The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Volume 2: The Romantic Period through the Twentieth Century by M.H. Abrams, Stephen Greenblatt
Rated: 4.19 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsFirmly grounded by the hallmark strengths of all Norton Anthologies--thorough and helpful introductory matter, judicious annotation, complete texts wherever possible--The Norton Anthology of English Literature has been revitalized in this Eighth Edition through the collaboration between six new editors and six seasoned ones...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult anthologies -
![The Gift of the Magi and Other Short Stories by O. Henry]()
The Gift of the Magi and Other Short Stories by O. Henry
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsHere are sixteen of the best stories by one of America's most popular storytellers. For nearly a century, the work of O. Henry has delighted readers with its humor, irony and colorful, real-life settings. The writer's own life had more than a touch of color and irony...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century anthologies audiobook fiction -
![The Emigrants by Vilhelm Moberg]()
The Emigrants by Vilhelm Moberg
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsConsidered one of Sweden's greatest 20th-century writers, Vilhelm Moberg created Karl Oskar and Kristina Nilsson to portray the joys and tragedies of daily life for early Swedish pioneers in America. His consistently faithful depiction of these humble people's lives is a major strength of the Emigrant Novels...Categorized as:
classics drama family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century action-adventure adult -
![The Major Plays by Anton Chekhov, Rosamund Bartlett]()
The Major Plays by Anton Chekhov, Rosamund Bartlett
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsAnton ChekhovThe Major PlaysIvanov * The Sea Gull * Uncle Vanya * The Three Sisters * The Cherry Orchard“Let the things that happen onstage be just as complex and yet just as simple as they are in life,” Chekhov once declared. “For instance, people are having a meal, just having a meal, but at the same time, their happiness is being created, or their lives are being smashed up...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century adult anthologies -
![The Immigrants by Howard Fast]()
The Immigrants by Howard Fast
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsIn a passionate, multigenerational novel set against the backdrop of San Francisco, the son of an Italian fisherman struggles from the rubble of the great earthquake to build a shipping empire. Reprint... -
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![The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham]()
The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham
Rated: 4.12 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsBased on the life of Paul Gauguin, The Moon and Sixpence is W. Somerset Maugham's ode to the powerful forces behind creative genius. Charles Strickland is a staid banker, a man of wealth and privilege. He is also a man possessed of an unquenchable desire to create art...Categorized as:
classics drama historical-fiction literary-fiction university 20th-century action-adventure adult -
![The Valley Of Decision by Marcia Davenport]()
The Valley Of Decision by Marcia Davenport
Rated: 4.25 of 5 stars · 8 ratingsOn the eve of World War II writer Marcia Davenport, best known for her biography of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, spent several years in Pittsburgh, her imagination caught by the drama of American industry. In 1942, Charles Scribner’s sons published her Pittsburgh novel, The Valley of Decision... -
![Selected Poems by Boris Pasternak, Борис Пастернак]()
Selected Poems by Boris Pasternak, Борис Пастернак
Rated: 4.20 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsAleksandr Blok (1880-1921) lived through his country's savage wars and radical traumas trying to welcome the new order. Trotsky wrote, `Certainly Blok is not one of us, but he came towards us. And that is what broke him.' Pasternak said, `He is as free as the wind... -
![The Family Moskat by Isaac Bashevis Singer]()
The Family Moskat by Isaac Bashevis Singer
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThe vanished way of life of Eastern European Jews in the early part of the twentieth century is the subject of this extraordinary novel. All the strata of this complex society were populated by powerfully individual personalities, and the whole community pulsated with life and vitality... -
![The Priory by Dorothy Whipple]()
The Priory by Dorothy Whipple
Rated: 4.17 of 5 stars · 12 ratingsThis 1939 country-house novel is set at Saunby Priory, a large house somewhere in England which has seen better times. We are shown the two Marwood girls, who are nearly grown-up, their father, the widower Major Marwood, and their aunt; then, as soon as their lives have been described, the Major proposes marriage to a woman much younger than himself - and many changes begin...Categorized as:
classics family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century adult book female-author -
![Amok and Other Stories by Stefan Zweig]()
Amok and Other Stories by Stefan Zweig
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsA doctor in the Dutch East Indies torn between his medical duty to help and his own mixed emotions; a middle-aged maidservant whose devotion to her master leads her to commit a terrible act; a hotel waiter whose love for an unapproachable aristocratic beauty culminates in an almost lyrical death, and a prisoner-of-war longing to be home again in Russia... -
![Climates by André Maurois]()
Climates by André Maurois
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsWritten in 1928 by French biographer and novelist Andre Maurois, Climates became a best seller in France and all over Europe. The first 100,000 copies printed of its Russian translation sold out the day they appeared in Moscow bookstores... -
![The Essential Plays by Anton Chekhov]()
The Essential Plays by Anton Chekhov
Rated: 4.13 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsBecause Chekhov’s plays convey the universally recognizable, sometimes comic, sometimes dramatic, frustrations of decent people trying to make sense of their lives, they remain as fresh and vigorous as when they were written a century ago... -
![All Change by Elizabeth Jane Howard]()
All Change by Elizabeth Jane Howard
Rated: 4.11 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe final book in the landmark Cazalet Chronicles, recently broadcast on BBC Radio...Categorized as:
classics drama family historical-fiction literary-fiction 20th-century 21st-century adult -
![Loving Liberty Levine by Colin Falconer]()
Loving Liberty Levine by Colin Falconer
Rated: 4.40 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsFrom the author of The Unkillable Kitty O’Kane comes a gripping novel about finding the American Dream—and what it costs.In 1913, Sarah Levine leaves her small village and sails to New York to start a promising new life with her husband, Micha. But all Sarah really wants is what has come so easily to her sisters—a family of her own... -
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![The Manor by Isaac Bashevis Singer]()
The Manor by Isaac Bashevis Singer
Rated: 4.10 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsThis novel portrays the difficulties encountered by traditionalist Jews coming to terms with the social changes that rocked Poland in the late 19th century. The central figure of the novel is Calman Jacoby, who stands between the old and the new, unable to embrace either whole-heartedly...Categorized as:
classics historical-fiction literary-fiction family fiction historical 20th-century book -
![American Dreams by John Jakes]()
American Dreams by John Jakes
Rated: 4.07 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsSpanning 1906-1917, the second generation of the immigrant Crown family sends three dreamers to new leading industries. Starlet Fritzi 26 aims for glamorous Hollywood. Her brother Carl soars in the skies of wartorn Europe. His cousin Paul screens footage of German army atrocities. The trio experience ambition, passion, adventure, glory, and sacrifice... -
![You Can't Go Home Again by Thomas Wolfe]()
You Can't Go Home Again by Thomas Wolfe
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsGeorge Webber has written a successful novel about his family and hometown. When he returns to that town he is shaken by the force of the outrage and hatred that greets him. Family and friends feel naked and exposed by the truths they have seen in his book, and their fury drives him from his home... -
![The Mother by Pearl S. Buck]()
The Mother by Pearl S. Buck
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsWithin this novel Ms. Buck paints the portrait of a poor woman living in a remote village whose joys are few and hardships are many. As the ancient traditions, which she bases her philosophies upon, begin to collide with the new ideals of the communist era, this peasant woman must find a balance between them and deal with the consequences... -
![The Sewing Machine by Natalie Fergie]()
The Sewing Machine by Natalie Fergie
Rated: 4.05 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsIt is 1911, and Jean is about to join the mass strike at the Singer factory. For her, nothing will be the same again. Decades later, in Edinburgh, Connie sews coded moments of her life into a notebook, as her mother did before her. More than 100 years after his grandmother’s sewing machine was made, Fred discovers a treasure trove of documents... -
![No Great Mischief by Alistair MacLeod]()
No Great Mischief by Alistair MacLeod
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsAlistair MacLeod musters all of the skill and grace that have won him an international following to give us No Great Mischief, the story of a fiercely loyal family and the tradition that drives it.Generations after their forebears went into exile, the MacDonalds still face seemingly unmitigated hardships and cruelties of life...
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