--• Tear Jerkers •--

Need a cathartic cry? Try some of these titles! These titles are located throughout the library; please find the location in the catalog by clicking on the title.

Applegate, Katherine – Sharing Sam (155 pages) - Alison and Sam have fallen in love, but when they learn that Alison's best friend Isabella, who also loves Sam, is dying, Alison pretends to step aside so Isabella can be happy in her final days.

Bechard, Margaret – Hanging on to Max (142 pages) - When his girlfriend decides to give their baby away, seventeen-year-old Sam is determined to keep him and raise him alone.

Blume, Judy – Tiger Eyes: A Novel (206 pages) - Resettled in the "Bomb City" with her mother and brother, Davey Wexler recovers from the shock of her father's death during a holdup of his 7-Eleven store in Atlantic City.

Bunting, Eve – Blackwater (146 pages) - When a boy and girl are drowned in the Blackwater River, thirteen-year-old Brodie must decide whether to confess that he may have caused the accident.

Chobsky, Stephen - The Perks of Being a Wallflower (213 pages) – A series of letters to an unknown correspondent details the life of Charlie as he copes with his best friend’s suicide and subsequently his own depression.

Corrigan, Eireann – You Remind Me of You (123 pages) – Autobiographical poems recount events in a teenager’s life, including her battles with eating disorders, her time in treatment facilities, and the suicide of her boyfriend.

Creech, Sharon – Love that Dog (86 pages) – A young student, who comes to love poetry through a personal understanding of what different famous poems mean to him, surprises himself by writing his own inspired poems.

Downham, Jenny – Before I Die (326 pages) – A terminally ill teenaged girl makes and carries out a list of things to do before she dies.

Draper, Sharon – Tears of a Tiger (162 pages) – The death of high school basketball star Rob Washington in an automobile accident affects the lives of his close friend Andy, who was driving the car, and many others in the school.

Ferris, Jean – Invincible Summer (167 pages) - Seventeen-year-old Robin, in treatment for leukemia, falls in love with a boy who also has the disease, and together they attempt to survive their ordeal.

Frank, E. R. – Wrecked (247 pages) – After a car accident seriously injures her best friend and kills her brother’s girlfriend, sixteen-year-old Anna tries to cope with her guilt and grief, while learning some truths about her family and herself.

Hurwin, Davida – A Time for Dancing (257 pages) – Seventeen-year-old best friends Samantha and Juliana tell their stories in alternating chapters after Juliana is diagnosed with cancer.

Johnson, Angela – The First Part Last (131 pages) - Bobby's carefree teenage life changes forever when he becomes a father and must care for his adored baby daughter.

Johnson, Kathleen Jeffrie – Target (175 pages) - After being brutally raped, Grady finally goes to a new high school where he meets an outgoing African American and several other students who try to help him deal with the horrible secret that is robbing him of his life.

Kadohata, Cynthia – Kira-Kira (244 pages) – Chronicles the close friendship between two Japanese-American sisters growing up in rural Georgia in the late 50s and early 60s, and the despair when one sister becomes terminally ill.

Katayama, Kyoichi – Socrates in Love (172 pages) – Sakutaro, a dry-witted teenage boy, is the perfect counterpart to Aki, a popular girl-next-door type. Puppy love slowly blooms into a more serious relationship. When Aki falls ill with leukemia, Sakutaro proves his love is true enough to test the bounds between life and death. The graphic novel (bib#591222) is also available.

Kerr, M.E. – Your Eyes in Stars (229 pages) – In their small New York town, two teenaged girls become friends while helping each other make sense of their families, neighbors, and selves as they approach adulthood in the years preceding WWII.

Keyes, Daniel – Flowers for Algernon (274 pages) - A thirty-two-year-old mentally handicapped man takes part in an innovative scientific experiment to raise his intelligence.

Klause, Annette Curtis – The Silver Kiss (168 pages) - A mysterious teenage boy harboring a dark secret helps Zoe come to terms with her mother's terminal illness.

Lester, Julius – When Dad Killed Mom (183 pages) – When Jenna and Jeremy’s father shoots and kills their artistic mother; they struggle to slowly rebuild a functioning family.

Lewis, Catherine – Postcards to Father Abraham (288 pages) – When sixteen-year-old Meghan loses her leg to cancer and her brother to Vietnam, she expresses intense anger in postcards which she writes to her idol, Abraham Lincoln.

Maynard, Joyce – The Usual Rules (390 pages) – After losing her mother in the September 11th attacks, young Wendy moves in with her father in California, where she meets her father's girlfriend and a sad bookstore owner while missing her half-brother back in New York.

Mazer, Norma Fox –

• After the Rain (291 pages) - After discovering her grandfather is dying, fifteen-year-old Rachel gets to know him better than ever before and finds the experience bittersweet.
• Girlhearts (210 pages) – Thirteen-year-old Sarabeth Silver’s life is turned upside-down when her mother dies suddenly, leaving her orphaned, confused, and at the mercy of everyone who seems to know what’s best for her.

McDaniel, Lurlene – The Time Capsule (215 pages) - Reminded of what life was once like by the opening of a first-grade time capsule, seventeen-year-old Alexis now faces the pressures of senior year in high school, her parents' total focus on work, and the recurrence of her twin brother's leukemia. This author is a prolific tearjerker novelist. Try any of her other books for more tearjerkers.

McGhee, Alison – All Rivers Flow to the Sea (168 pages) – After a car accident in the Adirondacks leaves her older sister Ivy brain-dead, seventeen-year-old Rose struggles with her grief and guilt as she slowly learns to let her sister go.

Morpurgo, Michael – Private Peaceful (202 pages) – When Thomas Peaceful’s older brother is forced to join the British Army, Thomas decides to sign up as well, although he is only fourteen years old, to prove himself to his country, his family, his childhood love Molly, and himself.

Nolan, Han – Dancing on the Edge (244 pages) – A young girl from a dysfunctional family creates for herself an alternative world which nearly results in her death but which ultimately leads her to reality.

Paul, Dominique – The Possibilities of Fireflies (217 pages) – Fourteen-year-old Ellie fights to keep her life together while her emotionally unstable mother deteriorates and her rebellious older sister begins to hang out with a rough crowd.

Peck, Robert Newton – A Day No Pigs Would Die (150 pages) - To a thirteen-year-old Vermont farm boy whose father slaughters pigs for a living, maturity comes early as he learns "doing what's got to be done," especially regarding his pet pig who cannot produce a litter.

Rabb, M.E. – Cures for Heartbreak (238 pages) – As she navigates adolescence, ninth-grader Mia must deal with her mother’s recent death and her father’s illness while she searches for friendship and love in the world around her.

Rapp, Adam – 33 Snowfish (179 pages) – A homeless boy, running from the police with a fifteen-year-old, drug-addicted prostitute, her boyfriend who just killed his parents, and a baby, gets the chance to make a better life for himself.

Rylant, Cynthia – I Had Seen Castles (97 pages) – Now an old man, John is haunted by memories of himself as an eighteen-year-old, enlisting to fight in World War II, a decision which forced him to face the horrors of war and changed his life forever.

Sebold, Alice – The Lovely Bones (328 pages) – Looking down from heaven, fourteen-year-old Susie Salmon recounts her rape and murder and watches her family as they cope with their grief and "the lovely bones" growing around her absence.

Segal, Erich – Love Story (131 pages) – The story of the love and marriage of a rich Harvard ice hockey player and a poor Radcliffe music student.

Smith, Betty – A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (420 pages) - young girl in a shabby neighborhood lives with dreams in an innocent time before the war.

Sparks, Nicholas – A Walk to Remember (240 pages) – A seventeen-year-old boy in 1950s North Carolina finds all his expectations overthrown by the Baptist minister's daughter.

Steinbeck, John – Of Mice and Men (186 pages) - The tragic story of two itinerant ranch hands on the run—one is the lifelong companion to the other, a developmentally disabled man.

Vincent, Erin – Grief Girl (306 pages) – A memoir of Vincent’s experience at losing her parents to a car accident at the age of fourteen, leaving her seventeen-year-old sister, herself, and her three-year-old brother behind.

Woods, Barbara – Emako Blue (124 pages) – Monterey, Savannah, Jamal, and Eddie have never had much to do with each other until Emako Blue shows up at chorus practice, but just as the lives of five LA high school students become intertwined, tragedy tears them apart.

Woodson, Jacqueline – If You Come Softly (184 pages) - After meeting at their private school in New York, fifteen-year-old Jeremiah, who is black and whose parents are separated, and Ellie, who is white and whose mother has twice abandoned her, fall in love and then try to cope with people's reactions.

Zeises, Lara – Bringing up the Bones (213 pages) - Bridget Edelstein mourns the loss of her high school boyfriend who died in a car crash, and rebounds with a new love.

Zusak, Markus – The Book Thief (552 pages) – Trying to make sense of the horrors of WWII, Death relates the story of Liesel – a young German girl whose book-stealing and story-telling talents help sustain her family and the Jewish man they are hiding, as well as their neighbors.

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