Sunday, June 19, 2011

Get Out Your Hankie

Recently, a patron asked me for suggestions for a really sad love story.  She’d been going through a breakup with her boyfriend and wanted to read something that reflected what she was feeling.  So I set out to find some real weepers and came up with the following titles.  So have you Kleenex handy when you take these on, because you’re going to need them!

The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.
Passionately in love, Clare and Henry vow to hold onto each other and their marriage as they struggle with the effects of Chrono-Displacement Disorder, a condition that casts Henry involuntarily into the world of time travel.

The Bridges of Madison County by Robert James Waller.
On assignment shooting the covered bridges in Iowa, photographer Robert Kincaid falls in love with Iowa native Francesca Johnson during four days of love, magic, and beauty.

Fireworks Over Toccoa by Jeffrey Stepakoff.
Eighty-four-year-old Lily Davis Woodward looks back at a turning point in her life, when she had to choose between her World War II soldier husband and the poor Italian immigrant planning the fireworks display to celebrate the soldiers' return.

Suzanne’s Diary For Nicholas by James Patterson.
Kate Wilkerson found her perfect man at last, then one day, without explanation, he disappears leaving behind only a diary for her to read. The diary is written by a new mother for her baby son, Nicholas. Soon it becomes clear to Kate that the man who left is the husband and father in this young family

Atonement by Ian McEwan.
Three children lose their innocence--as the sweltering summer heat bears down on the hottest day in 1935--and their lives are changed forever.

P.S. I Love You by Cecelia Ahern.
Holly has always depended on her husband's practical advice to keep her going and despairs when she loses him to brain cancer, until a package arrives filled with advice for carrying on with her life without her beloved husband.

Romeo And Juliet by William Shakespeare.
The classic play in which two children from warring families fall in love, with a tragic result.

Shadow Patriots by Lucia St. Clair Robson.
Her family torn between her parents' loyalist stance and her brother's decision to join Washington's forces, Philadelphia Quaker Kate Darby finds herself falling for a handsome major who is being sheltered in her home and turning spy for the patriot forces.

Love Story by Erich Segal.
A bittersweet contemporary love story chronicles the romance and marriage of Oliver Barrett, IV, a wealthy Harvard ice hockey player from a stuffy aristocratic family, and Jenny Cavilleri, a poor Radcliffe music student from a working class background.

Cold Mountain
by Charles Frazier.
After Inman escapes from a war hospital in 1864 and starts walking to Cold Mountain, Ada struggles to save her mountain farm with the help of Ruby, an illiterate but efficient farmer.

The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje.
In Cairo, a man meets a married woman with whom he falls in love, but the war keeps them apart and destroys her while he, severely burned, lives to tell their story to a nurse caring for him in an abandoned Tuscan villa.

kb

No comments:

Post a Comment