Fuck me... Goodbye Mog

[TiddleToddle]

There aren't many children's books which I haven't managed to finish but I cannot get to the end of this one.

Has anyone else read any other tear jerking children's books?

Tears in the bookshop here as well for Goodbye Mog. Not the book, but literally the only thing I remember about the film Ring of Bright Water, which I saw in the cinema as a small child, is the scene with the spade. I don’t think I’ve watched an animal film since.

Dustbin Baby by Jacqueline Wilson had me sobbing.

Many! Goodbye Mog, Charlotte’s Web (as a child and an adult). There’s one I can’t remember the name of which I couldn’t even have in the house - little girl goes to visit Grandparents and has wonderful time with Grandad. They go to the beach and have a lovely time. Then she visits and there’s no trip to the sea, or adventures (picture of Grandad in armchair, knee rug, stick in hand). Then she visits again - picture of Grandad’s empty chair, knee rug neatly folded, stick hanging on the arm......Also another book I can’t remember the title, little girl is got out of bed in the night by Mum and they go to the beach by moonlight and play and paddle. Mum carries tired girl home and they have toast before bed. Mum tells her ‘remember, this is how life is meant to be’.

King Oak of Sevenoaks. The seven oaks, all with names (the Tree of Music, the Tree of Sorrow, the Tree of Sport) are aware of their impending fate on the night of the great storm of 1987, and they tell stories of things they have seen; but one by one, they are uprooted by the wind, except one. "He stood alone, King Oak, Great Oak... One Oak, and huge tears flowed down his branches as he grieved for the six who had fallen."

Some of the 1980s Ladybird books of fairy tales were real tear-jerkers, especially with the cassettes that went with them, which played music such as Beethoven's 6th. "The dwarfs took it in turn to sit always by the coffin, day and night. There Snow White lay, as if still alive, but sleeping. Even the birds came and wept to see her lying so still."

There is a picture book called Only One of Me, with Mum and Dad versions. It's a beautiful picture book which a woman with terminal cancer created for her two children. It's so lovely and sad.

Paper Dolls every time, I can’t read it to class.
As a complete moment of self pity it’s at the end when the girl grows up to be a mummy and teaches it to her own child and I know I’ll never have that.

I cried a LOT reading Wonder to DS last year. Fabulous book though.

No Matter What and Love You Forever were tricky to get through when the DC were younger too.

Before You Sleep by Benji Bennett. I could never make it through that book when my kids were small. It's not so much the book itself as the context, Benji wrote it as a tribute to his son Adam after he died suddenly at the age of 4.

Yes to 'Once there were giants' . Almost sobbing now as my children are teenagers and our remaining parents frail. I remember reading it to them when they were tiny and this stage seemed so far off. Time really does go in the blink of any eye.

One that left me choked was 'The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey'.

Wherever you are my love will find you by Nancy Tilman
Was bought for my daughter when she was born. Shes an IVF miracle baby.
Cant even get past the first page without choking up.

Can't bring myself to even look at goodbye mog. Definitely guess how much I love you. Yes to dobby dying too

The Little Prince, The Butterfly Lion And Shadow get me every time

charlotteFlax

I’m with you. First read Love You Forever when my DS was five. Now he’s 32 and the story is unfolding before my eyes! DS laughs at me of course but I can’t think of it without tearing up!! 😪

I can’t finish Paper Dolls. Innocuous Christmas films always give me a lump in my throat and the song ‘three little men in a flying saucer’ makes me tear up...weird I know, but it’s the bit where they ‘look left and right, but they didn’t like the sight’ that makes me sad. Whoosh.

I’ve just read the DESCRIPTION for Once There Were Giants and it’s set me off!

Goodnight mr Tom
Love you forever
Not a book but the rainbow bridge poem

I read warhorse to me ds. Crowd at virtually every chapter.
Also listened to another Michael Morporgo as an audio book. Can't remember the title but it was about a whale. Driving down the M6 in absolute floods of tears.

I read 'The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas'

You know that many Holocaust survivors find that book really offensive? Children sent to death camps went straight to the gas chambers; manoeuvring the Holocaust to write best-selling fiction isn't the most tasteful.

Guess How Much We Love You, DM bought it for DS when he was born, and I can’t get through it without breaking my heart crying.

And then when I read the note she wrote for him in the front, she talks about him being very special and very much loved and wanted and having a beautiful, special Mummy, and seeing her handwriting again just breaks me completely!

Fuck, I miss her 😢

@Weatherforducks , whoosh indeed ( sobs quietly )

Another vote for No Matter What by Debi Gliori - my boys are 18 and 20 now, and I haven't read it to them for about 13 years, but was trying to tell a friend about it last week and couldn't even quote it without crying!

“Small said, "But what about when we are dead and gone, will you love me then, does love go on?"

…Large (replied) "Look at the stars, how they shine and glow, but some of the stars died a long time ago. Still they shine in the evening skies, for you see…love like starlight never dies…”

Tom's Midnight Garden by Phillipa Pearce, at the end when he realises that old Mrs Bartholomew who lives upstairs is the little girl Hattie that he used to play with in the Midnight garden. The bit where they recognise each other always starts the tears! I liked the book so much I named my dd Harriet after Hattie.

I was a student when Goodbye Mog was published. I read it in Waterstones and left in tears.

I bought Guess How Much I Love You when my baby was born and I couldn’t actually get through it until she was well over a year old. The Velveteen Rabbit is another one that makes me proper cry.

Oh CHEMENGER - Ring Of Bright Water. I watched it on telly as a kid and honestly cried for hours. It still puts a chill through me just thinking about it. And then the credits with the otters playing in the water

Anything bittersweet by James Herriot.

Oh God, there's one terribly sad one where a boy who's neglected by his abusive parents and is turning into a 'bad lad'. He takes on a half grown puppy from somewhere, and it straightens him out as he has to start working doing chores for people or whatever, and he finally has something to love who'll love him back. But the pup gets distemper and after weeks of trying to save it James has to put it to sleep. After that the boy really goes off the rails and eventually ends up in prison. It's heartbreaking.

As for children's books, that one Michael Morpurgo wrote about the farm hit with foot and mouth is traumatising. In fact I've learned not to pick up anything with his name on the cover.

Oh lord this thread alone has me sobbing.

Love you Forever
Goodbye Mog
Black Beauty

Can't read any of them now, too traumatic...