Not that I read a lot, but up until a few days ago, only two books ever made me cry: Eugene O’Kelly’s memoir Chasing Daylight, which I read as someone in my family was going through a similar illness (I’m grateful that our story continues), and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (perhaps because I could picture "that scene" so vividly, it was like I’d already seen the movie — and films frequently destroy me).
But then I read If I Stay, the young adult novel by Gayle Forman that Twilight director Catherine Hardwicke is set to bring to the big screen, and I had to add another title to the list. It’s about Mia, a 17-year-old girl from Oregon who gets into a car accident with her parents and younger brother. The choice of whether she stays (lives) or goes (dies) is hers and plays out over a 196-page outerbody experience that you’ll want to read in one sitting. At least, that’s how I did it. On a crowded train. Hoping no one saw how many times my eyes welled up (starting at page 18) until a single tear fell down my left cheek. Though we reveal the reason why her decision is so difficult in our review of the book, I’d recommend not spoiling it for yourself.
Your turn. Which books have made you cry?
More tearful entertainment:
EW’s 50 Most Heartbreaking Songs of All Time
EW’s 50 Best Movie Tearjerkers Ever (50-26)
EW’s 50 Best Movie Tearjerkers Ever (The Top 25)
PopWatch Confessional: The TV moments that made you cry
The Kite Runner definitely. I remember I was on a bus trip through Europe and I couldn’t stop crying right up until the last page. My friends were in shock I reacted so strongly.
Now I’m like, well duh! Truly thnkaufl for your help.
At 5:30 in the morning the day Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince was released, my dad came rushing down the stairs to ask what was wrong because I was sobbing like a baby.
He was not pleased that I had A) stayed up all night to read and B) woken him from a sound sleep.
There have been a couple books that made me cry. Marley and Me is one of them. I had just had to put my black Lab down due to Cancer about 2 weeks before I read this book. Another book that made me cry was My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult. I know they are turning this into a movie and I can’t wait to see it!!!
Boy’s Life by Robert McCammon. In many places. It tore me to shreds.
Sorry to double post, but Jenna, your comment reminded me. I was on an airplane when I read A Thousand Splendid Suns, and I was weeping like a leaky faucet.
Dewey. Yes, the book about the library cat. Quit laughing at me.
HP and the Deathly Hallows for me, too. Also:
Les Miserables
The Return of the King (after I saw the movie, the Grey Havens scene made me well up)
The Kite Runner
The Lovely Bones
I’m sure this will be a common one but “Marley and Me”, I was sobbing on a full flight. Also, Eli Wiesel’s “Night”. I read it in 10th grade and I cried through 2 class periods.
I read Bridge to Terebithia in 5th grade, and once Leslie died I started crying and basically didn’t stop until the end. Knowing Katherine Patterson’s reason for writing the book as well as a few years later experiencing the death of a good friend who was far too young to go only makes this lovely book more poignant for me.
I think I cried at least a little while reading ALL of the Harry Potters but more specifically the Goblet of Fire, Order of the Pheonix (this one KILLED me), Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows (I cried for literally the last 10 chapters of the book…). Also, The Kite Runner, The Time Traveller’s Wife, The Lovely Bones, White Oleander, Marley and Me, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, and The Forbidden Game (which I bet no one has ever even heard of). I can’t help it. I am a crier.
The last time I remember bawling all the way through a book was when I read ‘Jane Eyre’ at age 11.
Atonement (so much better than the movie!)
and when I was little, Where the Red Fern Grows. Er, ok, I still tear up thinking about that ending.
Isabel Allende’s memoir “Paula” made me sob. Even though you know from the beginning of the book that her daughter is going to die from a mysterious illness, when it finally happens at the end, you are still not prepared for it. A moving and poetic book.
Way too many to count, but the end of “To Kill a Mockingbird” can always get me to well up.
I was sobbing pretty much all the way through “The Time Traveler’s Wife”. Wonderfully romantic and sad.