Awkward family pet photos, by Mike Bender and Doug Chernack

There’s the soft-focus portrait of three siblings and their pet iguanas, perched fetchingly on their shoulders and heads. There’s Mum, Dad and the kids lying on the floor, the family boa constrictor coiled around their necks... Photograph: PR

...And, most disturbing of all, there’s the monochrome Athena-style shot of a semi-naked man and his dog, pooch clamped to owner’s stomach, the man’s eyes closed in what appears, horrifyingly, like rapture. Photograph: PR

No one, it seems, does awkward family pet photographs quite like Americans. These portraits capture the unalloyed devotion people have for their animals, a fervour perhaps matched only by us Brits – but without our sense of the absurd. Photograph: PR

What would otherwise be unremarkable (but, it must be said, often excruciating) family snaps are rendered so much more inelegant by the inclusion of monkeys in dresses, toddlers clutching uncomfortable-looking rabbits, and startled cats. Photograph: PR

In many cases, the pets are treated as a member of the family – which, the owners would argue, they are. But this philosophy makes for unintentionally silly photographs. Thus a snowy portrait of a perfectly nice-looking family in pyramid formation is spoiled by the pet dog peeking out near the top. Photograph: unknown/PR

It’s the photographs in which humans play second fiddle to creatures that are ripest for ridicule. In one, every family member is clad in fur to match the dog centre stage. Photograph: PR

Elsewhere, it’s hard to look at anyone else but the capybara in a neck scarf. Photograph: PR

Many of the photos appear to be taken from those decades of poor taste, the 70s and 80s. So we probably shouldn’t hold it against the (human) subjects now – particularly as they are admirably self-deprecating enough to have their embarrassing photographs published at all. Photograph: PR

At this time of year, a combination of family, bad sweaters and too much port could lead to equally cringe-worthy snaps you might spend the rest of your life trying to forget. You have been warned. Awkward Family Pet Photos by Mike Bender and Doug Chernack is published by Bantam Press at £12.99. To order a copy for £9.74, call 0330 333 6846 or visit guardianbookshop.co.uk. Photograph: PR