It’s said that one reason readers enjoy a sad story is that experiencing tragedy in a novel makes us reflect on our own life and count our blessings. Relish tear-jerking emotions with one of these books from the Lititz Public Library.
This Is Your Life, Harriet Chance! by Jonathan Evison
Embarking on an ill-conceived Alaskan cruise, a septuagenarian reunites with her estranged daughter and confronts the true character of her husband, who died two years earlier.
One Day by David Nicholls
After meeting in 1988, snapshots of a couple’s relationship are revealed on the same day – July 15th – of each year, revealing their squabbles, hopes, missed opportunities, laughter and tears.
The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb
Relocating to a family farm in Connecticut after surviving the Columbine school shootings, a teacher and his wife discover a cache of family memorabilia dating back five generations which reveals unexpected truths about painful past events.
After You’d Gone by Maggie O’Farrell
A woman riding a train to Scotland witnesses something so shocking that she insists on returning to London and only a few hours later she is lying in a coma after an accident that may or may not have been a suicide attempt.
The Outcast by Sadie Jones
Traumatized after his mother’s accidental death years earlier, a nineteen-year-old who has just been released from prison finds his hopes for a new start derailed by old demons.
Hotel at the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
The heartwarming story of a widower, his father and his first love is set in the ethnic neighborhoods of Seattle during WWII and Japanese-American internment camps of the era.
What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty
After a fall, a twenty-nine-year-old woman, pregnant and in love with her husband, wakes up on the floor of a gym and discovers she’s actually thirty-nine, has three children and is in the midst of an acrimonious divorce.
Say Her Name by Francisco Goldman
Consumed with grief and guilt after the accidental death of his wife, a man obsessively collects every memory of her with the hope of keeping her alive in his mind.
Five Days Left by Julie Lawson Timmer
A terminally ill career woman, wife and mother and a middle-aged school teacher whose eight-year-old foster son is about to return to his former-inmate mother, face the last five days they have to say goodbye to their loved ones.
Tell the Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt
A shy fourteen-year-old girl is devastated by her beloved uncle’s death until a surprise acquaintance comes into her life and becomes an unexpected friend.
The Known World by Edward P. Jones
Set before the Civil War, a former slave is mentored by powerful landowner and becomes proprietor of his own plantation, as well as of his own slaves, but things begin to fall apart when he dies and families that once found love beneath the weight of slavery begin to betray one another.
A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman
A grumpy yet loveable man finds his solitary world upturned when a boisterous young family moves in next door.
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
Before she ends it all, a sixteen-year-old girl yearning to escape her loneliness, decides to document the life of her great grandmother, a Buddhist nun who has lived more than a century.
Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay
In 1942, during a Nazi-directed round-up of Jews by the French police, a ten-year-old girl locks her younger brother in a cupboard in the family’s apartment thinking she will be back within a few hours.
October 30, 2015