Top Ten Tuesday

This is a neat weekly feature over at a blog I really enjoy, The Broke and the Bookish.  They read books similar to some that I've been reviewing, and they're fun and they write well.  Totally worth checking out.

It's raining here in my corner of NC today.  This Top Ten is just perfect for an overly gloomy day.

Top Ten Books That Will Make You Cry

(One note: *my* list is mostly books that almost made me cry.  I very rarely actually shed tears over books.)

1. Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys.  Fiction.  Teen Jewish girl narrator is shipped off to Siberia with her mom & younger brother to live in a Siberian work camp during WWII.

2. In the Sea There are Crocodiles by Enaiatollah Akbari.  Fiction based on a true story.  Young boy flees terrible hardship and abuse in multiple countries and grows up a refugee.  Heartbreaking what the boy goes through just to live.

3. Push by Sapphire.  Fiction.  Teen girl is raped and abused (mentally & physically) over and over and over and over again.

4. Wonder by R.J. Palacio.  Fiction.  Young boy is starting public school for the first time in fifth grade.  He has a facial deformity and that's rough but he's got such a good indomitable spirit and spunk to him.

5. The Time-Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.  Fiction.  The couple's long, hard journey to having a child kind of tore me up.

6. Gerald's Game by Stephen King.  Fiction.  Oh, the absolute horror...  This is one book I came very, very, very close to DNFing.

7. Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper. Fiction.  Another one with a kid with a major disability to overcome.  I guess I have a soft spot for kids who have it extra rough in life, and who overcome the odds and make friends.

8. The Kid by Sapphire.  Fiction.  Young boy loses his mother at an early age and is being raised in a boys' home where he is sexually abused by the staff and where he himself becomes an abuser because he simply doesn't know any other way to show affection.  So.  Sad.  This is the follow-up to Push by Sapphire.

9. Room by Emma Donoghue.  Fiction.  As soon as you figure out where Jack and his mother are, your heart breaks.

10. Ripples by Lee Gilliland.  Non Fiction.  A girl and her sisters lose their father in a horrible car accident when they were young; mother remarries; the guy's a total jerk.  Made all the more emotional for me because I know the author personally.

What about you?  What books have made you cry?

I'm actually surprised that I could come up with 10.  I studiously avoid books that are billeted as books that'll make you cry.