A Separate Peace question

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

Since it deals with a life wasted and a love lost, Kazuo Ishiguro's "The Remains of the Day" has always been one of the saddest books I've read.

Revolutionary Road left me with a pit in my stomach for a week. I'm not aware of any book that's better at describing modern emptiness.

Tess of d'Ubervilles, Jude the Obscure, Mayor of Casterbridge (Thomas Hardy), Wings of a Dove (Henry James), Sound and the Fury, Absalon Absalon (William Faulkner). All very beautiful, heartbreakingly beautiful.

The House of Mirth. Lily Bart broke my heart!

For me, it's a tie between "Behind the Beautiful Forevers" by Katherine Boo and "We Were the Mulvaneys" by Joyce Carol Oates.

"The Fault in Our Stars" and "Me Before You" were just so sad. I thought about both books for days after I read them. And, they were also two of my all-time favorite books. Couldn't recommend them highly enough:)

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1.) A Separate Peace
2.) Where the Red Fern Groes
3.) Old Yeller
4.) Tuck Everlasting
5.) The Giver

A Separate Peace

The Giver was kind of sad. I had to read both of these when I was a kid.

I don't read those kind of books anymore.

Probably the saddest book I ever read was ME BEFORE YOU by Jojo Moyes, yet it was also a deeply rewarding and satisfying read. One of my favorite ever, probably. I also loved and SOBBED over Pat Conroy's LORDS OF DISCIPLINE.

Pretty much any book where dogs die, looking for alaska, tfios, and it sounds kind of dumb but allegiant.

When I was 10, "Where the Red Fern Grows" was epicly sad. I think it depends on your life at the time and your experiences. I thought "Terms of Endearment" was extremely sad, but I had just lost my father to cancer. I thought "Bridges of Madison County" was very sad. I love my dog, so Marley and Me, and The Art of racing in the Rain hit me hard. Just depends.

I would add Tender is the Night and Death in Venice to the list. They are about the loss of dignity. Crushing to read.

Charlotte's Web. I didn't read it until I was 35 and I burst out crying when you-know-what happens. Another sad book, though not in the children's book way, was "The Loser" by the Hungarian writer George Konrad.
Synopsis:
In this novel by the author of the acclaimed Case Worker, a Hungarian intellectual reflects on his life before and after his country's bitter transformation to a Communist state. Now, at 55, a failed son, brother, husband, lover, and revolutionary, he finds himself behind the wall of an insane asylum, feeling curiously protected from the world on the other side.

Unbearable Lightness of Being and Cold Mountain come to mind. Oh, and The Education of Little Tree. I sobbed!

Sarahs Key is heart wrenching.

Since the 1st time I've read it, this still haunts me as the saddest story I've ever read; Guy de Maupassant's "Butterball," or "Boule de Suif." It was the 1st time that the theme of a class barrier actually hit home with resonance. Also the menace of depravity and humiliation.

Sixty-odd years ago, as a tyke, I read Salten's "Bambi", and couldn't smile for maybe a week. I owe the late Salten a tub of gratitude, because the experience hooked me on reading...

As an adult, Helene Hanff's "84 Charing Cross Road had me laughing through the innards of it and broken-hearted at the end -- an emotional workout of the first order. Kawabata's "Snow Country" merits a sniffling nod also.

Well, not to sound like a complete mainstream fool here but Catcher in the Rye. Like so many people, I mourned the destruction of my own innocence but more so the destruction of all innocence.

Like many people I felt like that person always wanting to rescue the innocent and at some point in your life you realize you can't.

I read CITR when I was in high school - I don't think it was assigned, but I knew it was an important book so I read it. I think my sister said she liked it. But as time went on I didn't think of every word and comma of it as sacred (as Salinger did) but I thought of the metaphor as perfect.

That feeling of sorrow over the perpetual destruction of the innocent continues to haunt me and probably will for my entire life.

Thinking about all those already mentioned, I'd have to agree on Carson McCuller's "Member of the Wedding." It evokes such an emptiness, but also a sort of courage in Frankie's crossing a threshold between adolescence and young adult. Also most of Faulkner's work, "As I Lay Dying," "When That Evening Sun Goes Down," "Sound and the Fury," being ones that pop to mind just now.

Michaela wrote: "A Separate Peace is the saddest book I've ever read. What's yours?"
I read a lot of sad books, but because I got so attached the characters, I cried the most for "Harry Potter". I know that it is not the saddest book that I have read, but it certainly made me cry the most. For stand alone books, I just cannot really lose myself in the book and grow attached to the characters as much as series. Although, I think one of the saddest stand alone books I read is "13 reasons why".

Two books come to mind right away: Cry The Beloved Country by Alan Paton and Eleni by Nicholas Gage.

ON THE JELLICO ROAD- This book is beautiful. So, so very sad but still one of my favourite books ever. I sobbed, truly sobbed all throughout reading this book. The characters are beautiful and your heart breaks for them and with them. It is a book that is sad because it is sad, not because the author is trying to manipulate your emotions. I have read and re-read this book and fall more in love with the story every time.

Norwegian wood by Haruki Murakami leaves this lingering feeling of sadness. Its a crazy effect. Im the most positive person but that shit got me feeling down. :P

Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Bambi by Felix Salten , a Christmas Memory by Truman Capote, and Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck are the saddest novels I've ever read.

I did not think a seprate peace was sad at all. I thought Living Dead girl and the lovley bones were two of the saddest i had ever read.

For fiction, Horace McCoy's They Shoot Horses Don't They tops my list for saddest books, followed by Revolutionary Road, Bridge to Terrabithia, and Lolita.

For nonfiction I'd have to say The Diary of Anne Frank was heartbreaking.

The saddest book I've ever read was The Pearl. Of course, Steinbeck makes anyone sad. I don't think he has any happy books.

Saddest ever? For me, The Mountain and the Valley by Ernest Buckler. It was probably a particular combination of time and place and personal state, but by God, for me, back in 1974, that was one sad book!

The Lovely Bones really affected me but I know the ones that left me upset for the longest were The Five People You Meet In Heaven by Mitch Albom and The Book Thief by Markus Zusak.

Taste of Blackberries, Marley and Me, Bridge to Terabithia, Where the Red Fern Grows, A Separate Peace are all on my list but the hardest book I ever read was called Eric which I believe was written by his mother Doris Lund. Damaged me a little.

The Diary of Anne Frank .... Night by Elie Wiesel. Both are at the top of the list and also the books by Jerzi Kozinski.

Say Her Name by Francisco Goldman just about ripped my heart out.

My top saddest book I've read was the Book Theif. I became so deeply attached to all the characters in the book that when it ended, I actually cried! I never cry, ever, not even during Titanic. I read this and I couldn't stop thinking about it for weeks, it was so depressing. The second in my list is deffinately A Separate Peace. We had to read it for English class and before I hadn't really heard much about it. I'm glad I read it.

Easily "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy. It was a giveaway at an Oprah show and 100% bummer.

Where the Red Fern Grows

Carson McCullers really packs a punch. I think The Member of the Wedding stands out - such "outsider-y" longing. This over the top - childlike - belief in something that the reader knows will never come true.

Two books about animals and both made into tear provoking movies come to mind: Old Yeller and The Yearling.

Maybe The Year of Magical Thinking by Didion...also Say Her Name by Goldman and My Antonia by Cather.

Book Thief and The Fault in Our Stars... I try not to read too many sad books.

Michaela wrote: "A Separate Peace is the saddest book I've ever read. What's yours?"
good book too. nice, thought provoking topic

Maus was pretty darn sad. It was about the Holocaust.

Bridges of Madison County

You are right about Steinbeck, for me it was "Of Mice And Men" and another that makes me sad is "The Winthrop Woman' by Anya Seton.

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter s probably the saddest novel I have read. The saddest non-fiction book is The Lost: A Search for Six of Six Million. It is one man's search for relatives lost to the holocaust. It is the last paragraph that just killed me. One of the best reads I have ever had and it is truly exhausting.

A Separate Peace is in the top of my list but I didn't enjoy it. One of the saddest books I've read that I really enjoyed was A Lesson Before Dying.