Favourite books with a sad ending?

[fifteenmillionmerits]

Mine are:
One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
Z for Zachariah by Robert C O'Brien
The Green Mile by Stephen King
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D Taylor

The Beekeeper of Aleppo. Just so real and tragic.

The time traveller's wife

The Song of Achilles (it wasn't me crying on the train reading the end, it was you!)

Agreed re The Go Between

The end of Lord of the Flies always gets me ("Ralph wept at the darkness of man's heart, and the fall through the air of the true, wise friend called Piggy").

Germinal

The Light Between Oceans. So sad.

Betty by Tiffany McDaniel absolutely broke me, but oh my goodness I haven’t felt so much love for a book as that.

I'm re-reading Lord of the Flies this week and yes to the gut-wtenching sadness of that quote at the end. Also Donna Tartt's The Secret History and the secrets that bind them all in gentle hopelessness. Plus Richard Adams and Girl in a Swing.

Atonement

Green Darkness. Anya Seton. Unbearaby sad ending.

Is the ending of The Goldfinch sad or ambiguous?

@Andante57

The Real Charlotte by Somerville & Ross.

I adore The Real Charlotte. I feel I have a Charlotte Mullen side...

Charlotte Bronte’s Villette.

Frogcorset I would love to know what happened to all the characters after the fatal fall from the horse.

@Andante57

Frogcorset I would love to know what happened to all the characters after the fatal fall from the horse.

Yes, would Charlotte have finally snagged Lambert? (Highly unlikely. But imagine that honeymoon...) Would Miss Hope-Drummond have snagged Christopher Dysart? Would Charlotte wrangle her way into significant money and status as the Dysarts decline? Would the Protestant orphan finally rebel over her treatment?

I wish someone would make a tv dramatisation — the old one with Jeananne Crowley and Patrick Bergen is a bit antique — but I suspect Charlotte is too grotesque to be appealing as a protagonist for adapters.

A God in Ruins. I cried a LOT.

Frogcorset hmmm……Charlotte and Lambert. Well unless she falls out of love with him like Scarlett O’Hara did with Ashley after Melanie died she she might entrap him by saying either marry me and I’ll pay all your debts including those to Christopher Dysart, or I’ll continue to persecute you, lay bare your dishonesty and have you in court for debt after which you’ll be cancelled by everyone.
Or, she might just continue to persecute him.

I hope Christopher Dysart didn’t marry Miss Hope Drummond as he may have been a bit wet but in those days he was still a catch, and she was a complete pill.

25 years later the Protestant orphan may have her revenge ….

Re a dramatisation, exactly as you said, in the one they made some years ago they failed to make Charlotte at all grotesque - in fact she was quite attractive - so much of the point was lost.
.
So nice to find another Real Charlotte fan!

@TheWindOnTheMoon agree, I sobbed the entire second half.

So I second The light between oceans

Half a world away. Had to explain to DH why I was sitting there bawling.
And Time Travellers Wife.

@Andante57

Frogcorset hmmm……Charlotte and Lambert. Well unless she falls out of love with him like Scarlett O’Hara did with Ashley after Melanie died she she might entrap him by saying either marry me and I’ll pay all your debts including those to Christopher Dysart, or I’ll continue to persecute you, lay bare your dishonesty and have you in court for debt after which you’ll be cancelled by everyone. Or, she might just continue to persecute him.

I hope Christopher Dysart didn’t marry Miss Hope Drummond as he may have been a bit wet but in those days he was still a catch, and she was a complete pill.

25 years later the Protestant orphan may have her revenge ….

Re a dramatisation, exactly as you said, in the one they made some years ago they failed to make Charlotte at all grotesque - in fact she was quite attractive - so much of the point was lost.
.
So nice to find another Real Charlotte fan!

I like your take on this, @Andante57. Have you considered writing a sequel, possibly called The Revenge of the Protestant Orphan, but which would also deal with the subsequent relationship of Charlotte and Roddy, and possibly force Pamela Dysart to declare herself to whoever her similarly tongue-tied suitor was?

Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck

The film with Sinise & Malkovich is the only film I had to immediately watch again and then again on the same day.

love Hemingway's books too; I think the titles are Farewell to the Arms and For whom the bells toll.
is Old man and the sea his as well? (brain fog)

Farewell to Arms is incredibly sad at the end.

Frogcorset - The Revenge of the Protestant Orphan would be a best seller for the title alone.

Atonement, Ian McEwan
The hand that first held mine, Maggie O'Farrell

Many already mentioned and Gone With The Wind.

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry. The characters all go through such appalling misery and degradation with no redemption at the end. An amazing book though!

The Time Travellers Wife. The ending in the book is different to the film but it made me cry when I read it.

Anna Karenina.