Books that are painful to read, but EVERYONE should!

'As Meat Loves Salt' - still haunts me, every day for about a month afterwards I woke up going !!

Cant remember authors name

and totally agree with moondog re: Dave P, a the risk of pissing someone off...

Happy like Murderers - Gordon Burns. This is an incredibly unsettling piece of investigative journalism,looking at the lives of Fred and Rosemary West and their victims.

Eefs, I know it was in March, but you're thinking of "I am David", about a Jewish boy in Europe caught up in the war.

Time's Arrow - brilliant book about a man who starts his life at the end when he's dying, and gradually gets younger.

Lovely Bones

OMG, a semi-retiree called dave, pmsl moondog, just had to show dp that post, he can't speak now. You may not have an ounce of whatever it was mymamma said - humanity or something, but you're very funny.

Private Peaceful. A children's book I know, but very, very moving.

The Woman Who Walked into Doors by Roddy Doyle is genius. The Gulag Archipelago.

Damaged is supposed to be hard to read, written by a foster mother about an abused girl she had in her care.

1984 - especially if you're pro-CCTV.

Between Two Eternities by Rosemary Kay.

Animal Farm. Absolute classic but as an animal lover I found it very sad.

Ditto Watership Down!

K

totally agree with Grapes of Wrath, Color Purple and Ivan Denisovitch , also whoever suggested The Tortilla Curtain - it's one of the best things Ive read in the last 10 years.

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison is magnificent IMO - extremely harrowing but still somehow beautiful and a real eye opener.

The Kindness of Women by JG Ballard is also very difficult reading in parts but it shows how he was permanently affected by his experiences in the Japanese POW camp, his wife's sudden death etc - brilliant. He also details the beginnings of his friend's dabbling in the car crash/sexual experience theme which he develops in another book of his called 'Crash'. He talks about how he dabbles in drugs and also has sexual encounters with prostitutes but at no time do you have anything but compassion for him. It really is a fantastic book.

I also think the Great Gatsby is a very sad novel, yet insightful and it really illuminates a certain time and place in American social history.I love that line 'They were careless people, Tom and Daisy, they smashed up people and things and then retreated into their vast moneyed world' ( probably a misquote!)

Thanks for the recommendation MarsLady - I'll add that to my Amazon Wishlist.

I think I would add 'Disgraced' by JM Coetze. The last few pages (the ones where he puts the dog down, if you've read it) of total emotional nihilism still haunt me.

'A Fine Balance' was a book I couldn't finish - just too sad. I find that as I get older, sad books have become harder and harder to read. It's not just about having children, although that has cranked up my emotional thermostat, it's something about seeing and experiencing more despair and sadness and ambivalence that makes the fictional version of these emotions tougher to get through.

(Issymum/Issyfit)

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry (I know it gets mentioned a lot on here) because it keeps me from whinging (sometimes)

Sickened shocked me deeply because it describes later in the protagonist's life she was a doctor's receptionist, and if mothers came in more than once with children, she used to refuse them an appointment! Hope she was sacked!

Lots here that I would agree with esp Mockingbird and Steinbeck. Would add Atonement - just found it so very sad. Still fail to understand why my mum thought I might like to read Dave Pelzer a month after the birth of my first child (a boy). Still haven't read it. Really don't need to know.

Agree wild swans

To kill a mockingbird

Brought back memories of books i haven't read in forever...

One I read recently - Defiant Births

Of Mice and Men by Steinbeck

Cry the beloved country

I think about is all over again now dd1 is that age

It is of course the same part that haunts me.
Read it over and over in mad hope that it would haVE a different ending.
She's written another one now,about a mercenary i think that she hung about with for a while.
Great writer.

the bit that I can't get out my head is when the little sister drowns in the pond and the author says the shopkeeper asked her did she love her sister and she replies no, but in fact she can't imagine loving anyone more.
god that still makes me cry now. I stooopidly read it when dd1 was about 6 weeks old.

Blimey,better make sure I'm in a healthy mental state before attempting it then...

If you like the Alexandra Fuller book, "Before the Knife - Memories of an African Childhood" by Carolyn Slaughter is also excellent, but even grimmer.

Harpsi,Alexandra Fuller was inschool with my cousins in Malawi.
Yes it does haunt doesn't it? I still think about it regularly.
Mymama,I bet he made it up.like that Millon Little Pieces bloke.

Don't let's go to the dogs tonight by Alexendra Fuller is a great book but god does it ever haunt me
I also read an account of the Magdelene laundries in Ireland, which was gut wrenching
Once in a House on Fire Andrea Ashworth

PandaG the Guardian on line had a Q&A with Ishiguro last month if you want to be a real smart arse at you book group discussion

I red NLMG 12 months ago and it still gives me haunting dreams

SICKENED IS HORRENDOUS oh sorry for the caps also lovely bones unfortunatley took that one on my honey moon no one warned me what is was about really upset me
i found angelas ashes really hard to read as mum said if you read this you'll understand what is was to be like us she grew up in nottinghams suburbs in the 60's and it was a similar situation