Books, like life itself, do not always portray a happy-go-lucky world view. This collection of novels and memoirs covers items that portray life realistically: the good times balanced by bad, happiness followed or proceded by sorrow. Because they go to the heart of human experience, they will reward you. Reminder: keep Kleenex handy.
McCourt tells the bleak tale of his impoverished childhood in Ireland with poignancy. He describes near starvation, an alcoholic father, the deaths of siblings and Catholic schools with compassion for his ineffectual mother.
An orphanage in rural Maine, an ether addicted abortion performing doctor, and migrant workers on an apple orchard make up the story of orphan Homer Wells, who must find his own way in the world.
A linguistics professor becomes obsessed with teaching his dog, the sole witness to his wife's death, to speak so he can find out the truth behind what happened to her.
Hugo's sweeping epic follows Jean Valjean and the many characters he encounters after being released from a long prison term before, during and after the French revolution.
This touching story of a Labrador Retriever who can't control his zest for life and wreaks havoc wherever he goes is told with fondness by columnist Grogan.
Steinbeck's tragic classic about George, intelligent and cynical, and Lennie, immensely strong but mentally limited, two drifters searching for land of their own where they can live peacefully.
At times hilarious, at times heartbreaking this novel relates the story of Dolores Price, an overweight, depressed woman who battles family dysfunction, rape and mental illness.
This heartbreaking classic focuses on Sophie, a Holocaust survivor, and her tortured lover, Nathan, as seen through the eyes of young Stingo, a writer in 1947 Brooklyn.
Chinese mothers and daughters alternately tell their stories. The daughters relate their experiences as first generation American-born Chinese, and the mothers detail the tribulations of their difficult lives in China.
Told in flashback by nonagenarian Jacob Jankowski this novel recounts the wild and wonderful period he spent caring for the poorly treated animals of the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth, a traveling circus he joined during the Great Depression.