books that made you cry?

[ZoranaDragon]

I've cried over books a few times before, though I think the first time a book made me cry was in elementary school. It was a book about Hachikō, a dog that waited 9 years for his owner to return. I think it was specifically Hachikō Waits by Lesléa Newman, though it's been so long since I've actually seen the book that I could be thinking of another similar book.

For those who don't know, it's based on a real dog who's owner had died. Hachikō would wait for his owner to return at a train station, and continued to wait even after his owner died. I cried when Hachikō died. There's a statue of Hachikō at the train station.

[fablefound]

there're quite a few books that get me in my feelings, if not in tears outright, but i think the ones that i remember having the biggest impact on me would be, in no particular order...
- my two favourite series are moomins and discworld and i've definitely gotten emotional over both. i finished the moomins novels late last year, which was immensely bittersweet, and i'm coming up on the last of the discworld books, which i know isn't going to be easy.
- i recently, finally read the last unicorn, by peter s. beagle. i don't know if there's another book out there quite like it. it's got such a beautiful, vivid melancholy to it that makes it feel so very dreamlike.
- the disney fairies novels--quest for the egg, quest for the wand, et cetera. the ones with the dreamy watercolour illustrations. prilla was the first fictional character i saw myself in, and everything she endures really resonates with me to this day.
- catwings. not the le guin title most people think of when they hear her name, but i enjoyed them a lot, and the character of jane really tugged at my heartstrings ;_;
- in the dream house, by carmen maria marchado. it's a memoir about the author's experience with domestic abuse in a lesbian relationship. i'll just say it resonated with me a lot.
- love you forever, by robert munsch. enough said.

[torquuato]

books have not really ever outright made me cry however, revisiting old books from childhood have definitely made me shed many a tear. recently reread the lord of the rings series and definetly felt some cry-worthy stuff. same effect sort of with certain harry potter books.

also, not a book but, WEPT to some parts of homestuck...

[mothpanic]

books almost never make me feel much, never mind cry, but I remember reading The Road by Cormac McCarthy and knowing just a dozen pages in that it would ruin me. for the life of me I can't explain what it was about that book. I think I had to stop reading 3 times because I didn't want to ruin the book I was holding.

when I was younger, I think 14, I'd been working through Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy and found the end heartbreakingly bittersweet.

[Eunice]

Beth's death in "Little Women" made me cry buckets. Then there's the death of Jacynth Hardy's Aunt in "Gay From China at the Chalet School". (That was her name, short for Gabriel. First published in 1944.) That was unbearably sad.