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s/o Pooh and tears: what books reliably make you cry?


fdrinca
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The post about crying at the end of House at Pooh Corner made me curious what gets the waterworks flowing for others.

 

My reliable tears list:

City Dog, Country Frog (Mo Willems)

The Clown of God (Tomie DePaola)

Charlotte's Web (some guy...wrote a style manual...) 

Junkyard Wonders (Patricia Polacco)

The Rag Coat (Lauren Mills)

 

I also remember crying big, sobbing, ugly tears at the end of Prayer for Owen Meany and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. I woke DH up with the latter; he found my crying in the bathroom.

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I don't usually cry more than once at a book, but these made me cry the first time:

Velveteen Rabbit (I could cry just thinking about it when I was a kid)

Tale of Two Cities

Never Let Me Go

Passage (Connie Willis)

Left Hand of Darkness (Le Guin)

Fionovar Trilogy (in the middle - I was a teenager, what can I say)

The Lantern Bearers (Sutcliff)

Son (Lowry)

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I know some people detest this book, but the ending of I'll Love you Forever makes me cry, but I've never actually read the book. What I mean is that I was somewhere at a concert and someone put the words to that book to music. I thought it was a song and didn't know it was a book for years. But the song had such a gentle melody that it just makes you weep at the ending. Actually, the song was a mixture of melody and straight reading.

 

That melody! That son carrying his old, dead mama! Makes me tear up right now thinking about it.

 

ETA: I just went to Youtube to see if I could find the song and there's one out there, but it's not the song I heard. The one on youtube has a goofy melody. The one I heard was really pretty.

Edited by Garga
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Charlotte's Web

Velveteen Rabbit

Where the Red Fern Grows

Old Yeller

Winds of War and War and Remembrance

The Book Thief

The Nightingale

 

There are others, but these are at the top of my head.  I won't "assign" the kids Red Fern or Yeller because I can't discuss with them, just too incredibly sad.  I especially hate the death of animals.  Or discarded toys.  Toy Story 3 chokes me up before I utter the name out loud.  My kids think I'm nuts.  :) 

 

 

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Gosh, lots of books. Practically all the award-bait books they print for children - Terebithia, Gilly Hopkins, Roxaboxen (waterworks, I swear)... all of it. Even books that are supposed to be funny make me tear up sometimes. I cry at the end of Pippi Longstocking, because I keep thinking that in the real world, that would be a bittersweet ending, poor Pippi all alone. I mean, honestly!

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Toy Story 3 chokes me up before I utter the name out loud.

 

For me, it's Lilo and Stitch. What sort of monsters abandon a little baby? Just because he doesn't know how to act! Well, of course Stitch didn't, he was a baby, but nobody was willing to teach him! And then he goes out to find his real family, like the Ugly Duckling and... omg. I bawl.

Edited by Tanaqui
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It's like we're twins, NatureMomma! Except I never even read Red Fern. I took one look at that synopsis when I was ten and noped that book right back on the shelf. No, no, no.

 

Ooh, Letters From the Inside is another one. Just re-read it the other day. Why did I do that?

Edited by Tanaqui
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Oh, Terebithia. That did make me bawl when I read it with the kids last year.

 

I don't reread books so often anymore but anything in new books can set me off. Ds is reading The War That Saved My Life and there's a bit about Dunkirk in there and it made me cry a bunch. Ds was like, good grief, what's your problem! Lately the thing that makes me cry is every time we get to "It's Quiet Uptown" in Hamilton I get weepy. Other ds does too sometimes. He likes to be sad. He cried a bunch for Terebithia too.

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All of them.

Sad endings make me cry. Happy endings make me cry. Reunions make me cry, and thoughtful gestures and, well, pretty much anything. I am a sap.

 

Ds's say, "Mom, are you crying again?" when I read aloud to them and have to pause. Of course I answer, "Noooooooo!" but sliding up into tea kettle range toward the end of the "No" kind of gives me away.

 

I don't know how I made it through the ending of Where the Red Fern Grows. Wait. I do, I think. I handed the book to eldest ds.

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I have cried with a few, but can't remember titles. However, we have a 9/11 that we read, well...every 9/11, and it gets me, every time. Specially when it mentions about the folks calling their loved ones before one of the planes went down... Just thinking about it makes me teary eyed

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It's rare for me to cry during a movie, reading a book silently, or listening to audio. If I am the one reading out loud I will cry at everything. E.ver.y.thing. I cried the most reading:

 

Nana Upstairs/Nana Downstairs

Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Cheaper By The Dozen

 

On my own I probably cried the most reading A Thousand Splendid Suns.

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There are several Patricia Polacco books that make me cry. Junkyard Wonders is one of them.

Charlotte's Web

Harry Potter

 

There are many more books that make me tear up and have to pause. I have not read Old Yeller or a where the Red Fern Grows to my kids yet but I know those would be hard.

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It's rare for me to cry during a movie, reading a book silently, or listening to audio. If I am the one reading out loud I will cry at everything. E.ver.y.thing. I cried the most reading:

 

Nana Upstairs/Nana Downstairs

Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

Cheaper By The Dozen

 

On my own I probably cried the most reading A Thousand Splendid Suns.

I'm not a crier, but Edward Tulane did me in several times over. I cried the entire last quarter of the book.

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Jacob Have I Loved - I read it at just the right/wrong time in my tween years, and I can still remember that feeling.

 

Where the Red Fern Grows - I used to read it aloud to my classroom, and I would start crying before the sad parts. The kids all thought I was nuts, but the next day we would all have tissues.

 

I have teared up at many the first time through, but those are my usual reread cries. We'll see when I start reading aloud something more interesting than "Brown Bear, Brown Bear" to my kids.

 

Now, if I NEED a good, cathartic cry, I'll pop in Steel Magnolias. I cry every. single. time.

Edited by HOPE_Academy
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Marley- we listened to the audio book about a year before our elderly dog died.

 

Someday- children's book about watching your child grow up.

 

The Long Winter- when Pa hacks into the wall to steal the hidden food

 

The Velveteen Rabbit- it reminds me of my son and his Dinosaur

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There are so many, but off the top of my head I can think of a few;

 

Charlotte's Web.  This is probably my all time favorite audio book. We have listened to it over and over and I still cry. 

 

The Little Match Girl.  With this one I sob uncontrollably.  I can remember at least one child laughing just a little at me crying so hard. :D

 

Thee, Hannah (most of De Angeli's books tend to tear me up, but I openly weep with this one)

 

Carry on, Mr Bowditch.  I have read that aloud 3 times, and listened to it on audio at least twice.  I always cry.  

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The last chapter of The Friendly Persuasion, i.e., Homer and the Lilies.  First book that ever made me cry, and it still will if I pull it off of the shelf.

 

Birchbark House, when the little boy dies of smallpox, and they talk about the older sister's friend, who had also died of smallpox, walking him to heaven because he's too little to go by himself.

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I think the most upset I ever got was over a short story about two kids (maybe preteens or upper elementary?) and their beloved pet dog getting in a boat and heading out into rough waters.  I was maybe 13.  A big storm rolls in.  The kids get into serious trouble and their boat is in danger of capsizing.  Because of a legend about some famous pirate whose ghost would let you live if you sacrificed someone, they toss their dog overboard.  They make it to shore.  When his collar washes up on shore a few days later they take that to mean that his spirit is now on board the pirate ship and he is happy.  No.  No he isn't.  He is dead.  You murdered him.  Poor Mom had to comfort me for days after that stupid story.

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I can't get through reading a Before You were Born to my kids without getting teary. They always ask what's wrong with me. Birth makes me happy cry. The Crippled Lamb gets me too. Really any books about the birth of Jesus.

 

When I was a young teenager, Rilla of Ingleside (the last Anne book, for anyone who hasn't read the whole series) made me cry more than any other book. Just typing this and thinking of the chapter "Little Dog Monday Knows" and Dog Monday's reaction when Jem finally comes home is getting me all choked up. Can you tell I've read it many times?

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Some of Palacco's stuff. Most recently Tucky Jo and Little Heart. Welcome Comfort for sure.

 

Oh yes! I cry like a baby when when read An Orange for Frankie at Christmas. My mother was so mean - she laughed at me about it and then was like, stop reading your children such depressing and bad books. Sigh.

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Charlotte's Web.  It's so bad I can't get through certain parts. 

 

Where the Red Fern Grows.  I read that book in 6th grade and never forgot it.  But it was such a tear jerker that I never chose it for my kids.  I don't want to read it again.

 

I'm drawing a blank regarding other books.  I cry over books a lot so the question that might be easier to answer is which books don't make me cry.  LOL 

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I can't get through reading a Before You were Born to my kids without getting teary. They always ask what's wrong with me. Birth makes me happy cry. The Crippled Lamb gets me too. Really any books about the birth of Jesus.

 

When I was a young teenager, Rilla of Ingleside (the last Anne book, for anyone who hasn't read the whole series) made me cry more than any other book. Just typing this and thinking of the chapter "Little Dog Monday Knows" and Dog Monday's reaction when Jem finally comes home is getting me all choked up. Can you tell I've read it many times?

 

I cry for Matthew, Joyce and Walter... every time.

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Lots of books make me cry, but I remember in a particular a stretch of about 2 years when Squirrelboy was obsessed with the Titanic but no a strong reader so I had to read every children's book about the Titanic we could find to him. I cried when I read about all those people dying every.single.time. Squirrelboy did not understand. He kept asking, "Why are you crying, Mom?" Don't get me wrong. He knew it was a tragedy. He thought it was sad. He just didn't think it was worth bawling over. Sure I know it happened over a hundred years ago and there have been much worse tragedies in the world, but so many things were done wrong in that particular disaster that could easily have been changed and saved so many people it makes me sad and angry every single time I read about it.

 

Just thinking about Bridge to Terabithia can make me cry, and any book where the dog dies makes me cry. I cry over happy endings sometimes, too.

 

ETA: How could I forget Matthew, Joyce, and Walter? I even cry sometimes when I read about Walter as a child, knowing what's going to happen to him.

Edited by kentuckymom
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Lots of books make me cry, but I remember in a particular a stretch of about 2 years when Squirrelboy was obsessed with the Titanic but no a strong reader so I had to read every children's book about the Titanic we could find to him. I cried when I read about all those people dying every.single.time. Squirrelboy did not understand. He kept asking, "Why are you crying, Mom?" Don't get me wrong. He knew it was a tragedy. He thought it was sad. He just didn't think it was worth bawling over. Sure I know it happened over a hundred years ago and there have been much worse tragedies in the world, but so many things were done wrong in that particular disaster that could easily have been changed and saved so many people it makes me sad and angry every single time I read about it.

 

Just thinking about Bridge to Terabithia can make me cry, and any book where the dog dies makes me cry. I cry over happy endings sometimes, too.

 

ETA: How could I forget Matthew, Joyce, and Walter? I even cry sometimes when I read about Walter as a child, knowing what's going to happen to him.

My ds went through a titanic phase too where he wanted me to read him every book on it and it did make me cry when it got to the part about the people dying. Ds also understood the tragedy. He wished more survived but he did not get the crying and would demand I keep reading when I had to pause. Edited by MistyMountain
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Oh, this thread is making me cry! Love You Forever (I know, I know), Dog Monday howling at the train station and Walter in Flanders and little Joyce--every single time. I also did the long, loud, ugly cry through the end of Number the Stars. Oh my word. 

 

And Steel Magnolias!!! Sally Field after the funeral... That movie made me cry when I was a teen, but the first time I saw it again after having kids? No words. And Stepmom too. Before kids, I thought it was a sappy, kind of trite movie. Then one year DH took the kids to his mother's house and left me to have time to myself on Mother's Day, and they were showing "mom-type" movies on Channel 11, and I watched Stepmom again, but with a whole new perspective. 

 

Oh, and at the end of My Own Heart's Blood, the most recent Outlander book. Three times now, and I know what's coming. "Hello the house!" Sobs.

 

I cry at pretty much everything now, including sappy commercials. But these are the worst. 

Edited by ILiveInFlipFlops
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