Book description
In the late 1970s Ondaatje returned to his native island of Sri Lanka. As he records his journey through the drug-like heat and intoxicating fragrances of that "pendant off the ear of India, " Ondaatje simultaneously retraces the baroque mythology of his Dutch-Ceylonese family. An inspired travel narrative and family…
Why read it?
1 author picked Running in the Family as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
A dizzying, intoxicating, completely engrossing memoir by another poet, who’s most famous as the author of The English Patient. I always feel a little tipsy, in the best way, reading this one.
Ondaatje was born in Sri Lanka and sets out as an adult from Canada to discover the mysteries left behind by eccentric, long-lost family members in a land he loves. Newspaper articles, pictures, ghost stories, and poetry comprise this one-of-a-kind narration. When his brother pleads with him to get this family history right, you feel the weight of the request as heavy as a summer rain.
From J.'s list on voice-driven, suck-you-in narrations: both memoir and fiction.
If you love Running in the Family...
Cyborg Fever
From Pulitzer Finalist Laurie Sheck (A Monster's Notes), a new speculative literary fiction in the spirit of Italo Calvino, Umberto Ecco and Donna Haraway's Cyborg Manifesto that enacts an incisive and moving exploration into what it means to be human in the age of AI and increasing inhumanism.…
Want books like Running in the Family?
Our community of 12,000+ authors has personally recommended 100 books like Running in the Family.
Share your top 3 reads of 2025!
And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.
1,277
readers submitted
so far, will you?
📚 If you like Running in the Family, you might also like...
EO-N
Spanning multiple timelines, EO-N weaves WWII mystery with contemporary social commentary.
Revolving around a missing aircraft discovered beneath a glacier decades after it disappeared, the story connects an American biotech executive, a Canadian investigator, the plane’s Canadian pilot, a disillusioned German pilot, and a young victim of Nazi horror.
Centering…
Existential Smut 2
Stories, essays & dialogues about art, imagination & the erotic life. A young man named Charles writes a series of erotic tales, and his bookish friend Lisa offers light-hearted critiques of them.
Some stories feel like erotic meditations or random erotic moments in a young man's life. Others start with…
