Is it wrong that the only book to ever make me cry proper real tears . . .

[TheCountessOlenska]

is Black Beauty

However many times I read it! And also, at several different points in the story!! (Ginger off to the knackers yard, Black Beauty's ruined knees, when James says "why it's our old Black Beauty from Orchard Farm, I'd know that star on his forehead anywhere" etc etc)

I don't even like horses that much

Nope! I always cry at animal books.

I had to confiscate Black Beauty because DD sobbed uncontrollably to the point when she couldn't breathe but kept trying to read it again. I hid it. Ditto when some kind soul gave them a DVD of the film.

About 6 years ago dad got hold of a copy of Ring of Bright Water and decided to let my eldest 2 watch it after he'd picked them up from school. After all they loved otters . I arrived to a houseful of sobbing, traumatised children. Dad had forgotten about the bit with the ditch and the spade.....

I cry at 'Black Beauty' too. I watched the movie version with DS, who passed me tissues at intervals and smirked at me. He gave me a hug afterwards and said 'You're a bit of a delicate soul, aren't you Mum?' (He's 6 fgs)

But the last book that made me cry uncontrollably was Sebastian Faulks 'Birdsong'. I was on the tube at the time. Proper snotty, gulpy crying in front of a packed carriage of about 50 total strangers...

We read Goodnight Mr Tom at school (last year of Juniors - Yr 6 in today's terms I suppose). I embarrassing myself horribly reading a part aloud to the class... I properly broke down crying. In front of a class of 10 year olds. I never did quite live that down

Goodnight Mr Tom is just unbearable. I weep at all war books. So yes, Birdsong, Atonement etc, etc.

Couldn't read Suite Francaise through the tears.

Oh God animal stories really get to me, so many of those already mentioned:

Watership Down - not helped by childhood film watching and Bright Eyes, but in the book Hazel getting shot, the Black Rabbit story, Bigwig's "last stand" and the ending all set me off.

His Dark Materials - them leaving their daemons (not really animals but it was close enough) at the riverbank and then the ending, which at least involved people!

Lots of bits in James Herriot - pretty much everytime an animal was suffering or died. (why was I reading stories written by a vet again?)

Black Beauty and Warhorse too for reasons previously sobbed about by everyone else.

No kids of my own to read too yet, but just the Amazon summary/reviews of Goodbye Mog has me sniffing and wiping my eyes at my desk, so that's not going on the reading list!

Michael Rosen's Sad Book - is heartbreaking, it had me in tears (The title is a bit of a clue though!)

Little Women when Beth dies

The Power of One, Tandia and Whitethorn, all by Bryce Courtenay, had me sobbing.

Proper, heaving, can't catch your breath sobbing.

Oh god - there is a book called Seven Little Australians - bit like a cross between What Katy Did and Little Women. It had me sobbing my heart out. Not just a few tears (that is quite common for me ) but full on sobbing.

YY to James Herriot too, especially if there is a quiet Yorkshire farmer (Dick something?) bearing the loss of his prized animal stoically.

YY to Goodnight Mr Tom too.

Funny to note these are all children's books. It's curious that we encourage children to read such traumatic stuff!

I knew this would be either Black Beauty or Watership Down, both made me sob uncontrollably and probably would if I read them again now.

It's rare for a book to make me cry these days (I'm fairly hard-hearted and tend to just get annoyed by blatant attempts to manipulate my emotions), but sad stories about animals will generally do it!

Oh God, I nearly cried in a bookshop reading Michael Rosen's Sad Book. The last pages, with a big party and then him alone in the dark with a single candle...

I shall only admit this here but the last or is it second to last book in louise rennisons georgia nicholsons series, where angus gets run over.... I sobbed my bloody heart out. Its a series aimed at young teenagers!!

I've been reading Harriet the Spy to DD and couldn't get through the part where Ole Golly leaves.

It made me sob as a child, but I thought at the age of 36, I'd be ok.
Nope.
DD had to read that page, while I bit my knuckles and tried to take deep breaths.

I can't read gobbalino the witches cat without crying my eyes out, I know it has a happy ending but I just can't get there, I've tried about 6 times and still cry then she gets turned away all the time. Hubby thinks I'm mad, and laughs.

I think it is fantastic that books can move me to the point of tears.

Tarka the Otter had me crying so hard as a child that I could not see to read, took the book to my mum for her to read it aloud to me!

I'm so glad I'm not the only one who cries over James Herriot books. The farmer who killed himself when his dog died had me in floods.

I'm in floods now.

"My ladies have promised that I shall never be sold, and so I have nothing to fear; and here my story ends. My troubles are all over, and I am at home; and often before I am quite awake, I fancy I am still in the orchard at Birtwick, standing with my old friends under the apple-trees".

Sob

But then I used to cry at the Baked Bean adverts.

I still haven't finished reading Black Beauty to DD as I kept crying.

On a discussion here a while ago about War horse (nope, never going near that one), someone quoted a piece from a book about a soldier and his horse who were both injured and the horse clung on to life until he knew his master was gone. That has left me emotionally scarred for life.

Stop it now!

The Emma books by Sheila Hocken. I never recovered from Emma dying.

Thanks for the accurate quote ithaka - I didn't manage to dig out BB for my OP, so I just made it up! Birtwick not Orchard Farm!!

Another children's animal story, Charlotte's Web

Minipie! I have never met anyone who had read 7 little australians! I loved that book as a child and yes, a real tear jerker. When the father looks out at the orchard at the end of the book and imagines he sees his daughter who had died....

Matthew dying in Anne of Green Gables, surely? 'my girl, that I'm proud of...'.