The saddest book you've ever read . . .

jude the obscure and sophies choice

Tess of the D'urbervilles

A Thousand Splendid Suns

Grapes of Wrath

Of Mice and Men [I cried and cried and cried]

Birdsong

Captain Corelli's Mandolin had me in tears on the tube several times.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt, the bit when Richard is hospitalized and Henry stays with him and looks after him and Richard writes (from memory):

"Of course Henry is dead now, but I like to think that somewhere there's a gold star by his name."

"Searching For Shona, children's book about two girls evacuated in Ww2 from Edinburgh. Ending is shocking and sad.

"What falls away" by Jay McInerny when Jeff dies of AIDs.

"Restoration" no majorly sad bits but just poignant throughout. The bit about having a tabard made for the King made me so sad.

"Year of Wonders" when the children die of plague. Happy and totally -unrealistic ending.

Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion about the year after her beloved husband died.

City of Thieves by David Banioff when the aspiring writer who has been so overly-confident throughout gets shot and dies.

I don't know how she does it by Allison Pearson, the bit where the mother who is dying writes a long "family manual" for her husband, entitled, "Your Family. How it works" and her funeral scene.

Agree about Jude. But I love it - I like tragic books!

Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami. Utterly depressing. But then, it is about depression.

bringbackgoingforgold - i agree about home, it made me cry and books don't usually - i think i like it better than gilead, but both are absolutely brilliant, and if anybody is looking for an incredibly thoughtful, gorgeously written book, i think they should go out and get them both.

Jude the Obscure.

Don't read it. That is how gutting it is.

Emma and the later books by Sheila Hocken, I reed them as a child and remember sobbing over parts of them.

I don't think I have been so affected by a book since.

A Thousand Splendid Suns. How could I forget that?

Not really a sad book, but I wept buckets at the end of The Amber Spyglass.

The most harrowing/affecting things I've read are Lucky by Alice Sebold and more recently The Road by Cormac McCarthy. I read it when I was pregnant and sobbed all the way through and then shortly after the babies were born we (my husband and I) tried to watch the film on DVD and he had to keep stopping it cos I kept bursting into tears. Such a grim, depressing story.

The God of Small Things - very moving but made me feel desperately sad and cast down. Wonderful, but I wouldn't recommend reading it if you're going through a low phase.

The Four Swans - an Irish legend retold in one of my childhood books of fairytales. Unbearably sad, and I think I find it more so as I get older.

The Kite Runner
Captain Corelli's Mandolin
Angela's Ashes
Katherine
Gone With The Wind
The Pursuit of Love

Mary Barton made me cry long ago but I remember feeling slightly annoyed with myself (or Mrs Gaskell) as I felt the scene, with two very unlikely people making up at a deathbed was a bit manipulative.

South Riding also made me cry long ago - and again very recently when I re-read it following the recent TV series.

mrs k, also didnt like a child called it! thought it a bit dubious x

Found the Outcast by Sadie Jones thoroughly depressing - and it had an optimistic ending. But it was written in such a depressing tone that I'll never read another book by her again.

And lots that have been mentioned.

Many of the ones above.

I cried and cried reading 'Deaf Sentence' by David Lodge. I was on the train, but this being England, everyone was terribly reserved and simply shuffled their newspapers.

When my DH met me at the station he thought something dreadful had happened.

I also cried when I read Goodbye Mog. In a bookshop.

But then I am a crier, it's one of the reasons I could never have a Kindle, I'd fuse it.

Home by Marilynne Robinson. Sad in the sense that while its predecessor Gilead also dealt with incredibly injured people and difficult things, there was at least a sense of the possibility of redemption. Home offers not a shred of hope or comfort. It is unremitting.

Having said that, I recommend it (and Gilead) wholeheartedly. They're both beautiful and profound and massively moving.

The Velveteen rabbit

I am haunted by Beloved by Toni Morrison. It's so bleak and I find it unbearable to know that that's what life was like for generations of people. They didn't even know their own names. Inhuman.

whispers I didn't believe A Child Called It. It just didn't ring true to me.

Opal

Birdsong
To Kill A Mockingbird
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (fictional story of a boy whose father was killed in the 9/11 attack)
The Grapes of Wrath
Chesil Beach
The Perks of Being A Wallflower

So many already listed.

I recently read "things I want my daughters to know" by Eliazbeth Noble and that had me crying on the bus.

It's making me want to cry just reading this. Loads already listed here,but A Prayer For Owen Meany, made me sob and sob.

Another vote for Birdsong

there's a goodbye mog?

have also just finished 'the hand that first held mine' so sad had a good weep and sophies choice x