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If you loved
Books like Running with Scissors
A hilariously horrifying plunge into a childhood where the adults are the lunatics and survival requires a razor-sharp sense of irony. These 12 books are the closest matches in mood, pace and themes, with what each one shares with Running with Scissors.
- chaotic
- surreal
- squalid
- absurd
- 01
The Liars' Club
Mary Karr · 1995
A fiercely funny, unsentimental plunge into a chaotic Texas childhood where storytelling is the only survival skill.
- 02
Girl, interrupted
Susanna Kaysen
A razor-sharp, fragmented descent into the parallel universe of a 1960s psychiatric ward that questions the very nature of sanity.
- 03
Lit
Mary Karr · 2009
A darkly hilarious, fiercely unsentimental plunge into the abyss of addiction and the messy, miraculous climb back out.
- 04
Prozac nation
Elizabeth Wurtzel · 1994
A torrential, unapologetic plunge into the messy, chaotic reality of coming of age under the crushing weight of clinical depression.
- 05
Sissy
Jacob Tobia
A funny, deeply moving exploration of growing up outside the gender binary that balances heartache with abundant joy.
- 06
Just Kids
Patti Smith · 2006
A tender, poetic elegy to a transformative friendship and the gritty, magical crucible of 1970s bohemian New York.
- 07
Genie
Russ Rymer · 1993
A heartbreaking and thought-provoking exploration of language, humanity, and the ethical failures of those who seek to study it.
- 08
The Burn Journals
Brent Runyon
An unflinching, intensely personal descent into adolescent despair and the agonizing, courageous climb back to normalcy.
- 09
Wasted
Marya Hornbacher · 1998
A visceral, unflinching descent into the claustrophobic grip of an eating disorder and the brutal fight to survive it.
- 10
One Christmas
Truman Capote · 1996
A tender, bittersweet journey through the loss of childhood innocence and the complex realities of family love during the holidays.
- 11
My lobotomy
Howard Dully and Charles Fleming · 2007
A harrowing but deeply human memoir about surviving the unthinkable and the lifelong quest to understand a family's ultimate betrayal.
- 12
The Basketball diaries
Jim Carroll · 1978
A raw, poetic plunge into the chaotic streets of 1960s New York, tracing a teenager's free-fall from athlete to addict.
