The Enid Blyton Society

I am not sure if this topic has been covered up already but I recently read the fault in our stars by john green and was in tears when I reached the end of the book. I guess this is the most touching book I have read till now. What's yours

The most touching scene in a children's book for me is the ending of The Rubadub Mystery when Barney is reunited with his father. "I'm looking for a son I've lost for fifteen years and I hear you've been looking for me", the father says. This line always gets to me.

Jennifer Worth's midwifery memoirs made me cry the first time I read them and again when I read them earlier in the year. Shadows of the Workhouse in particular I had to stop reading after a chapter or two at a time as I could hardly see the pages for tears.

I don't think I could pick out just one book as "the most touching". For me, it's more a question of touching moments. These would include:

- Certain scenes between Joe and Pip in Charles Dickens' Great Expectations

- The ending of Tom's Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce

- The story of the elderly couple in the caves in Enid Blyton's The Valley of Adventure.

I can't think of one particular book, but I'd definitely agree with Anita, that the story of the couple in The Valley of Adventure is quite special.

Anita Bensoussane wrote:
The ending of Tom's Midnight Garden by Philippa Pearce

I must say I agree with you, Anita. The ending of Tom's Midnight Garden is very touching indeed.

"Tom's Midnight Garden" was the first book that came to my mind as well. I also feel that way with the last few sentences of "The Last Battle" from the Narnia series by C.S. Lewis. I think that "The Secret Garden" is quite a touching story too.

Difficult topic but the one that springs to mind for me is "Cecilia - Memoirs of An Heiress" 1782 by Frances Burney.

I guess it is a typical novel of it's period but I just love the section where Cecilia is in absolute despair. Her secret marriage is known about, her fortune lost, her husband gone. She throws herself on her father-in-law who casts her out and she has a mental breakdown. Found by strangers who assume she has escaped from an asylum she sinks deeper and deeper into a fever.... It's very melodramatic but well done and really piles on the pathos.

Dr Lyster makes his speech afterwards about "Pride and Prejudice" which is presumed to have influenced the title of Jane Austen's famous novel.

Cecilia gets a mention in Austen's Northanger Abbey "'And what are you reading, Miss — ?' 'Oh! It is only a novel!' replies the young lady, while she lays down her book with affected indifference, or momentary shame. 'It is only Cecilia, or Camilla, or Belinda'; or, in short, only some work in which the greatest powers of the mind are displayed, in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineation of its varieties, the liveliest effusions of wit and humour, are conveyed to the world in the best–chosen language."

I'm currently reading Five Run Away Together and have got to the part where George comes home to discover her mother has been taken into hospital. It's only a brief passage, but I found it quite moving - the despair poor George must have felt as she rushed from room to room.

I think that "A Little Princess" by Frances Hodgeson Burnett is very touching, especially the part in which her father dies. All the same,"A Little Princess" is my favourite book as well.

I found a lot of the book Goodnight Mr Tom by Michelle Magorian very emotional and upsetting (about the war and evacuation) Also The Six Bad Boys by Enid Blyton has a rather sad ending, too for some of the characters.

I think "Watership Down" is one of the most poignant books I've read. I remember welling up when Bigwig gets caught in the snare and Hazel says "My heart has joined the thousand for my friend stopped running today". I still find the ending really sad too although it's not supposed to be. The very end of Stephen King's "It" I find heartbreaking as well as all the children start forgetting each other again.

It's a long time since I read Richard Adams' Watership Down, but I also recall finding certain episodes heartbreaking. Other animal books which moved me were Black Beauty by Anna Sewell and various titles by Felix Salten, including Bambi and Bambi's Children.

floragord wrote:Susan Hill's FAMILY - it is a deeply personal book, the story of the birth and death of her second daughter - so not for everyone, but certainly the most touching I can remember reading to date.

I was thinking about this thread last night and it probably is true to say that anything 'real' is likely to be much more touching than fiction. You only have to read any wartime experiences - for example - and they beat most fiction hands down in terms of their ability to touch.

Going ever so slightly off tangent, that led me to the Adrian Mole books. I grew up with the originals; being just two years younger than the character. Then throughout the more recent books there have been many elements that I can relate to; similarities to my own life. The recent death of the author, Sue Townsend, was almost like two deaths. Sad for her and her family. Sad for the reader too because it is like the untimely death of Adrian Mole; someone I 'grew up with'. That did touch me, I must admit.