Fearsome Five: Top Five Families You'd Hate To Spend the Holidays With

"DAD'S HERE TO CARVE SOME TURKEYS!"

The holidays can be a time to sit down together with the family and share some special moments. For some, any time with the family is an ultimate test of endurance. It could be anything from asking how close you are to a full-time job to commenting how you will no doubt die alone. Existential grief notwithstanding, and in letting people who may not always enjoy their family know that it could always get worse, today’s Fearsome Five list features five families you definitely don’t want to spend the holidays with.

5) The Morrow family in Ania Ahlborn’s Brother. A visit to the country sounds like a great place to spend the holidays, but people traveling down to the Morrow’s neck of the woods have a way of disappearing. It’s true that Michael Morrow isn’t necessarily interested in the family business, and might seem friendly enough, but it’s the others like brother Rebel that you have to watch out for.

4) The Radleys in Matt Haig’s The Radleys. Now being vampires shouldn’t automatically disqualify a family from hosting a pleasant holiday meal, but being a creature of the night, and being a member of this family, has its drawbacks. Even if you weren’t the main course, you’d still be privy to a family’s dysfunctional fraying as the bonds that hold them together begin to come apart. And even if you liked watching a family fall apart, there’s still a chance that they’d eat you or perhaps keep you in the basement like canned preserves.

3) The White family from Stephen King’s Carrie. Before Carrie used her telekinesis to wreak havoc on all those that wronged her, she was a girl forced to live with a mother who was both physically and mentally abusive. Imagine trying to avoid Margaret White’s pontifications about religion and her daughter’s “whore pillows” while avoiding Carrie’s telekinetically flung silverware. And there is no anecdote that exists to ease the tension in a room after a table is telekinetically flipped.

2) The Bates family from Robert Bloch’s Psycho. Norman really said all you need to know when he said that “a boy’s best friend is his mother.” Best to not get between that. Besides, they probably wouldn’t have enough for anyone other than the two of them.

1) The Blackwoods from Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle.  Sure, there’s Merricat’s and Constance’s distrust of strangers that would make any holiday gathering awkward, but having a meal with them might be the last meal that you’d ever have, particularly if you have a sweet tooth.