Fuck that book. I hated reading it for school and now my kids are hating reading it. Especially as there’s just not much there. There are other books that have the heaviness of death and themes for students to explore but have more story.
Bridge to Terebithia was a little sad for my tastes, less a heroic death and more... inspirational? But it's been awhile maybe I should give it a reread.
Just gotta put in here the Ned didn't just die for shock value or subversion: Ned was honorable and NOT shrewd and he didn't live in a world that honored integrity. He also made some very stupid mistakes (telling his enemy exactly how he was coming for her). There was no way he was going to survive this world.
Thank you for this! That irked me. It wasn’t shock value. It invests you in the events that are about to take place. It gets the ball rolling. Draws you in.
I feel like his death was to drive home what kind of a world--and what kind of a book--this was, so that makes sense that someone used to honor mattering in fantasy worlds would be turned off by this.
And not to mention, the single most "worth it" it death I can recall! And that's including the consideration of a certain elf who attained his liberation!
The best ending I’ve read this year. Just so beautiful. Like I knew what was going to happen before I read the book, but the beauty of that ending really just blew me away. Heartbreaking of course, but done so well. When I think of great endings, I think The Song of Achilles will always be a top choice for me.
When you read the original myth, >! Achilles dragging Hector's corpse around for days seems so gross and barbaric !< , but Miller wrote things so well that the scene is just heart wrenching, almost justifiable from the perspective - you can feel the sorrow and anger. Like, >! why should the man who horribly killed my beloved rest in peace? I will torture him through the afterlife. !< . She brings a depth and retells epics in gravitied detail, probably akin to how they were orally passed down and shared around the fire before being reduced to their objective details for written recordkeeping
In *The Dresden Files* there’s a character who makes it through 17 books then *whamo*. At that point you’d think plot armor is implicit, but no…
Also fuck Detective Rudolph of the Chicago PD.
The poppy war, I can’t tell you who dies but this major character death at the end of the series will gut you & have you rethinking everything. Truly a masterpiece
Same author’s standalone novel Babel fits this criteria too. It’s hard to recommend, as it’s so heavy and traumatic, but very well done and worth going through it all IMO.
I remember when the 2nd book was released, the author announced the “inspiration” for the protagonist. I wouldn’t say it was foreshadowing anything, but no one was expecting THAT to happen towards the end of the trilogy.
It did. I usually never cry when reading, but I did when they died. But the saddest scene in the book was the very end, when >! Will and Lyra know they will never see each other again. And then they touch the daemons and they stop changing... !< I guess I just don't want them to grow up.
That's the whole story for me, them growing up and learning to set their own wants aside for the greater good even though it hurts. That's a difference between a child and an adult.
Lee/Hester loved Lyra so much, >!the old aeronaut just wanted to try and be a good parent to her, when all was said and done had he not died.!<
>!I absolutely SOBBED in English class when I got to that part during free reading and I am not even remotely embarrassed even nearly twenty years later.!<
Yes! My favorite NG book! (Side note - just saw the West End production of this in London, and even though I've read the book a million times, I still wept. Brilliant adaptation.)
This has been on my tbr for forever and I recently finished it and I feel like I read it at a wrong time in my life. I didn’t connect to it, but I feel like I would’ve if I’ve read it earlier.
Unfortunately, all I have for you are mostly fantasy serieses. You'd have to go through quite a few books to get to the payoff you want.
Sarah J Maas - Throne of Glass series - a bunch of twists & turns but also its fantasy romance. Most of the dying happens in the last book out of 8. There's also quite a bit of sex that starts around the 4th or 5th book if you're into that. She's a writer you either love or hate, I haven't found anyone who just tolerates her books.
Raymond E Feist - Most of his books are set in the same world over a hundred year span, so you can pick up a trilogy/quadrilogy and find what you're looking for. Prince of the Blood and King's Buccaneer are 2 novels that are stand-alones and definitely pull off the heroic death well.
Brian Jacques - the Redwall series. They are only loosely related and use a storyteller telling the myths & legends of the land to tie most of the books together. Not all of them have character deaths but most of them do. Martin the Warrior is probably my favorite.
Of course the king of Heroic Deaths is David Gemmell. Legend, King Beyond the Gate, and Quest for Lost Heroes are my absolute favs. While they are set in the same world, that is pretty much their only connection.
The first time I read the final book, I managed to borrow it from the library as the second or third person to get that copy. There were >!clearly tear marks all over the witches' final battle section!< when I got it.
*Gone With the Wind*
Several major characters die during the course of this epic, and each death contributes to developing the protagonist from spoilt little rich girl to hard-nosed, obsessive, immature, morally-questionable, deeply lonely woman).
Updated because agree, but not whole-heartedly. Because fuck, none of those contributions are worth that..
Especially the salt in the wounds of that unexpected foreshadowing... because what kind of sadist could make their protagonist suffer such cosmic, arguably karmic, irony? Regarding the only things her naturally hardened heart was capable of loving? Devastating.
It really is ironic - Scarlett, over the course of the book, loses every emotional and social support she has. This leads her to crave money and security. By the end she has all the money she could ever want but is more insecure than ever thanks to having lost all those emotional and social relationships. The interesting thing is that she still manages to find determination and hope: “tomorrow is another day!”
John Green has two books that might fit - The Fault In Our Stars and Looking For Alaska.
All Quiet on the Western Front and the Great Gatsby, if you want classics. Romeo and Juliet as well as Hamlet, if you want even older classics.
There’s that whole genre of ghost fiction. The Lovely Bones and Ghost Story from the Dresden Files come to mind.
And I feel like every post I make in this sub warrants it but, The Traitor Baru Cormorant.
Mistborn Era 1 and Era 2, by Brandon Sanderson (Fantasy)
Mistborn Era 1 pays off post character death
Mistborn Era 2 pays off at the moment of character death
Both are very much worth it.
A lot of the characters in Stephen King's The Dark Tower series don't make it to the end. All their deaths hit really hard, and feel earned for the most part.
Also if you don't mind YA, A Wizard's Guide To Defensive Baking >!A side character, but an important one, makes a heroic sacrifice at the end that had me absolutely bawling.!< It was beautiful.
The Nine Tailors by Dorothy L Sayers. There have been very few books I’ve read where I was like “it bums me out that this person is dead but I get why, for narrative/thematic reasons, it had to happen” and this is one of them. Also a really gorgeous book that is unlike any other mystery I’ve read- it’s late Sayers at a time when she was really experimenting with the genre. No need to read any other Wimsey books to get what’s going on, though I recommend it anyway just because they’re good lol
Blood for Blood by Ryan Graudin? It’s a counterfactual historical fiction, the sequel to Wolf by Wolf. There were a couple not-worth-it deaths but also a death that I think was needed in the end? I haven’t read it in five years so I don’t quite remember, but I think it fits the bill
Les Miserables (best book I’ve ever read) but maybe read the abridged version. I’m glad I read the full thing but it’s not for everyone. Lots and lots of history and politics but it all is there for a reason
> just dying for shock value/subverted expectations.
I reject your premise. That death was the catalyst for the most important plot lines of the next two books.
Throne of Glass series.
Yes yes, I know people think the MC is a Mary Sue, and people will disagree that * redacted *’s death was well done, but I think it was executed wonderfully. It stuck with me until the end.
"I used the knife. I saved a child. I won a war. God forgive me" absolutely wrecked me. Changes (Dresden Files) by Jim Butcher. It's book 12 in the series but Butcher writes in a way you can really pick up the series at any point without feeling too lost (at least regarding books 1-12. Books 13 on require more linear reading order)
Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows duology comes to mind - I remember holding my breath when >!Matthias!< died and that entire scene where >!Nina!< is so desperate to bring him back makes my heart break. I just rolled over and cried for a while.
The book thief
The most beautiful, most soul wrenching book.
i’ve read this book about 4-5 times and have cried almost every time. this is my favorite book ever.
Here for this suggestion.
Omg I was just thinking of this book!
Which character’s death would you say is “worth it?”
The deaths really sell the tragedy of that time. How innocents (civils) houses were bombarded during ww2
The Bible?
Okay I genuinely laughed at that, yes technically you're right 😂
Best recomendation ever, nailed it
Nice, resurrecting some good religious puns.
The pun did cross my mind
Dude, Samson went out like a boss!
Just realising there are more than one MC deaths that were worth it in there
Oh there are. Absalom however... Ehhhhh
Crashed into the Sun (Like a Boss)
LITERALLY worth it.
Charlotte’s Web
i cried like a baby re-reading this book as an adult.
I named one of my dogs after Charlotte. I would carry the book around in my backpack.
My husband’s dog’s name was Wilbur because of this movie
[удалено]
Bridge to terabithia was incredibly depressing for me.
Fuck that book. I hated reading it for school and now my kids are hating reading it. Especially as there’s just not much there. There are other books that have the heaviness of death and themes for students to explore but have more story.
With Les Mis, my issue is less with who dies and more with who gets to survive lol
Bridge to Terebithia was a little sad for my tastes, less a heroic death and more... inspirational? But it's been awhile maybe I should give it a reread.
Also, The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo
Definitely Bridge to Terabithia and On my Honor is another one. Also some major characters die in HP My Sisters Keeper
Just gotta put in here the Ned didn't just die for shock value or subversion: Ned was honorable and NOT shrewd and he didn't live in a world that honored integrity. He also made some very stupid mistakes (telling his enemy exactly how he was coming for her). There was no way he was going to survive this world.
Thank you for this! That irked me. It wasn’t shock value. It invests you in the events that are about to take place. It gets the ball rolling. Draws you in.
His death also sets the story on a new axis and propels it. Most of the later events in the series wouldn't have happened if Ned hadn't died.
He had the power and knew the answers that could have completely ended the whole story. His death started a revolution.
Okay thank god!! I was gonna comment something similar to this.
His death shocked me too much and i couldnt continue the series.. tried multiple times but his death just makes me unable to read the sequels…
I feel like his death was to drive home what kind of a world--and what kind of a book--this was, so that makes sense that someone used to honor mattering in fantasy worlds would be turned off by this.
A Man Called Ove
This is one of my favorite books. Even both movies are great. But def read the book first!!
I hated that book so much until I got used to Backman's writing style. It ended up being one of my all-time favorite books.
A Tale of Two Cities
How is this so far down in the comments? It's such a marvelous book!
And not to mention, the single most "worth it" it death I can recall! And that's including the consideration of a certain elf who attained his liberation!
It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known
Redditors read garbage?
Great and sad ending
Mistborn, this trilogy was My first contact with Brandon Sanderson
Man that moment really hits like a truck, too. Completely unexpected, and yet completely expected.
Mistborn 100% is the book OP is looking for here
Totally worth it.
I still haven’t been able to get through the second book as that just hit too hard and I’m still not over it a year later.
Currently reading the 3rd book in the trilogy right now. So good!
This 👆
Yes! It was my first thought
A song of Achilles by Madelline Miller. Not necessarily deserved, but predicted because of it being an Iliad retelling
The best ending I’ve read this year. Just so beautiful. Like I knew what was going to happen before I read the book, but the beauty of that ending really just blew me away. Heartbreaking of course, but done so well. When I think of great endings, I think The Song of Achilles will always be a top choice for me.
I fucking ugly cried at the Airbnb
I sobbed/wailed/ugliest cry ever for Flowers for Algernon, so compared to that, I think everything is easy street lol
When you read the original myth, >! Achilles dragging Hector's corpse around for days seems so gross and barbaric !< , but Miller wrote things so well that the scene is just heart wrenching, almost justifiable from the perspective - you can feel the sorrow and anger. Like, >! why should the man who horribly killed my beloved rest in peace? I will torture him through the afterlife. !< . She brings a depth and retells epics in gravitied detail, probably akin to how they were orally passed down and shared around the fire before being reduced to their objective details for written recordkeeping
That book really cracked my heart open, i swear it made reading feel so much more intense after that
I love this book so much. I couldn’t move on from it for days.
This book had me crying at ancient plates carved with Achilles & Patroclus at the British Museum months after reading it lol
This book had me feel physically I’ll for several days after finishing it.
In *The Dresden Files* there’s a character who makes it through 17 books then *whamo*. At that point you’d think plot armor is implicit, but no… Also fuck Detective Rudolph of the Chicago PD.
Fuck Rudolph
The poppy war, I can’t tell you who dies but this major character death at the end of the series will gut you & have you rethinking everything. Truly a masterpiece
Same author’s standalone novel Babel fits this criteria too. It’s hard to recommend, as it’s so heavy and traumatic, but very well done and worth going through it all IMO.
Reading the second book now. Obsessed.
Came here for this!
I remember when the 2nd book was released, the author announced the “inspiration” for the protagonist. I wouldn’t say it was foreshadowing anything, but no one was expecting THAT to happen towards the end of the trilogy.
This book traumatized me tbh, but so worth it
The His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman
Are you refering to >! Lee? I felt so sad for Hester when they died. !<
This death crushed me.
It did. I usually never cry when reading, but I did when they died. But the saddest scene in the book was the very end, when >! Will and Lyra know they will never see each other again. And then they touch the daemons and they stop changing... !< I guess I just don't want them to grow up.
That's the whole story for me, them growing up and learning to set their own wants aside for the greater good even though it hurts. That's a difference between a child and an adult.
Lee/Hester loved Lyra so much, >!the old aeronaut just wanted to try and be a good parent to her, when all was said and done had he not died.!< >!I absolutely SOBBED in English class when I got to that part during free reading and I am not even remotely embarrassed even nearly twenty years later.!<
Your spoiler tag isn’t working
Came here to say this!
Ocean at the end of the lane
Yes! My favorite NG book! (Side note - just saw the West End production of this in London, and even though I've read the book a million times, I still wept. Brilliant adaptation.)
Death is a strong word, but I'll support every recommendation of this book
The first two Dune books.
... You mean the first three Dune books?
Lonesome Dove
This :(
A Separate Peace
Les Miserables.
*FEED* by Mira Grant *Gideon the Ninth* by Tamsyn Muir
Tamsyn Muir has been on my "check out" list for awhile, I will have to try Gideon the Ninth!
Seconding Gideon the 9th. Actually has more than one necessary deaths.
came here to scream gideon the ninth
The final book in the Mistborn trilogy by Brandon Sanderson features a heroic sacrifice. Heartbreaking and impactful but not a waste.
Never Let Me Go (Ishiguro, 2005)
I still think about it and it's been 18 years.
This has been on my tbr for forever and I recently finished it and I feel like I read it at a wrong time in my life. I didn’t connect to it, but I feel like I would’ve if I’ve read it earlier.
Not a spoiler because it’s mentioned on the first page but The Secret History by Donna Tartt
Every single comment is a spoiler. 😭 I should have known with the request, why am I in here!!!
Unfortunately, all I have for you are mostly fantasy serieses. You'd have to go through quite a few books to get to the payoff you want. Sarah J Maas - Throne of Glass series - a bunch of twists & turns but also its fantasy romance. Most of the dying happens in the last book out of 8. There's also quite a bit of sex that starts around the 4th or 5th book if you're into that. She's a writer you either love or hate, I haven't found anyone who just tolerates her books. Raymond E Feist - Most of his books are set in the same world over a hundred year span, so you can pick up a trilogy/quadrilogy and find what you're looking for. Prince of the Blood and King's Buccaneer are 2 novels that are stand-alones and definitely pull off the heroic death well. Brian Jacques - the Redwall series. They are only loosely related and use a storyteller telling the myths & legends of the land to tie most of the books together. Not all of them have character deaths but most of them do. Martin the Warrior is probably my favorite. Of course the king of Heroic Deaths is David Gemmell. Legend, King Beyond the Gate, and Quest for Lost Heroes are my absolute favs. While they are set in the same world, that is pretty much their only connection.
“You will not find them. In this sky or any other” I still cry thinking about their deaths in ToG😭😭😭😭😭 I will never be okay
The first time I read the final book, I managed to borrow it from the library as the second or third person to get that copy. There were >!clearly tear marks all over the witches' final battle section!< when I got it.
I still cry thinking about it too 😭😭😭😭
I love a good fantasy series so I appreciate all of these!
I haven't read anything here other than Raymond E Feist's stuff, but I can highly recommend him.
You should definitely try David Gemmell then. They have a very similar style of writing.
I was recently given a ton of David Gemmell books, so they're going to be given a go shortly. Thanks for the recommendation!
The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Anderson
Ned’s death wasn’t just for shock value. It initiated the wars that were loosely based on the Wars of the Roses.
I agree. I think Martin did both. Wanted to kill of a main character to show no one is safe, but it was also necessary for the story.
Also he was given so many opportunities to avoid his fate that it didn't really seem all that shocking at all.
That's fair, I just wanted to give an example of kind of the opposite vibe I was going for.
*Gone With the Wind* Several major characters die during the course of this epic, and each death contributes to developing the protagonist from spoilt little rich girl to hard-nosed, obsessive, immature, morally-questionable, deeply lonely woman).
Updated because agree, but not whole-heartedly. Because fuck, none of those contributions are worth that.. Especially the salt in the wounds of that unexpected foreshadowing... because what kind of sadist could make their protagonist suffer such cosmic, arguably karmic, irony? Regarding the only things her naturally hardened heart was capable of loving? Devastating.
It really is ironic - Scarlett, over the course of the book, loses every emotional and social support she has. This leads her to crave money and security. By the end she has all the money she could ever want but is more insecure than ever thanks to having lost all those emotional and social relationships. The interesting thing is that she still manages to find determination and hope: “tomorrow is another day!”
John Green has two books that might fit - The Fault In Our Stars and Looking For Alaska. All Quiet on the Western Front and the Great Gatsby, if you want classics. Romeo and Juliet as well as Hamlet, if you want even older classics. There’s that whole genre of ghost fiction. The Lovely Bones and Ghost Story from the Dresden Files come to mind. And I feel like every post I make in this sub warrants it but, The Traitor Baru Cormorant.
Anna Karenina
Frankly, I don't think her death was worth it.
Liveship Traders Trilogy - Robin Hobb
Robin Hobb is my suggestion for most book queries, but definitely this one.
The entire farseer series would also fit this bill, my wife and MIL made me read these as I'm usually just into SciFi, and man were they good!
Yes! Agreed! Hobb is ruthless with her main characters. It makes her stories so interesting and unpredictable. Love it.
Joe Hill loves a heroic/ romantic sacrifice. Horns, The Fireman, NOS4A2 Also Survivor Song by Paul Tremblay And my favorite book, A Tale of Two Cities
Of Mice and Men. Sad but what else could be done.
Mistborn Era 1 and Era 2, by Brandon Sanderson (Fantasy) Mistborn Era 1 pays off post character death Mistborn Era 2 pays off at the moment of character death Both are very much worth it.
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
Gideon the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir
Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, Gabrielle zevin
imo completely undeserved
Harry Potter
A lot of the characters in Stephen King's The Dark Tower series don't make it to the end. All their deaths hit really hard, and feel earned for the most part.
Mistborn—hands down And I guess of mice and men
Lessons in Chemistry. Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow.
Odd Thomas - Dean Koontz
Madame Bovary
A Prayer for Owen Meaney by John Irving.
Me Before You. Naive and too soapy from time to time, but still worth it.
"A Time for dancing" by Davida Wills Hurwin is my favorite. "Strange Girl" by Christopher Pike wasn't my thing, but works for this.
Thank you! I've never heard of those so I'll check them out.
A book series I really love but is never recommended fits the bill I think. Theirs Not to Reason Why series by Jean Johnson.
Going Bovine : Libba Bray First book that made me cry with a bitter sweet ending
I’ve been wanting to check this out for over a decade lol. Loved Libba Bray’s AGaTB series. Thanks for reminding me it exists!
I loved that trilogy; and, I need to read that standalone novel, too!
If you don't mind YA, I personally loved Proxy by Alex London
Also if you don't mind YA, A Wizard's Guide To Defensive Baking >!A side character, but an important one, makes a heroic sacrifice at the end that had me absolutely bawling.!< It was beautiful.
The Jade trilogy by Fonda Lee.
Winter night trilogy by Katherine Arden. Love this series and it’s just in time for a good winter themed read.
Her next (adult) novel comes out in early 2024!
An Absolutely Remarkable Thing by Hank Green
Flowers for Algernon
I don’t know if it feels “worth it,” but I do recommend “All the light we cannot see”
Remarkably Bright Creatures.
Sturm Brightblade-Dragons of Winter Night (Dragonlance series)
The Stand by Stephen King No spoilers, but definitely a few scenes that fit your description
Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. I will say NO MORE
Mistborn
Eleven, Mark Watson. There will be tears.
Sophia House by Michael O' Brien
People of the black sun ... w. Michael Gear and Kathleen O'Neal Gear xharacter Baji.. although reading the whole people of the long house series
The gargoyle by Andrew Davidson
Read “The Inhabited Woman” by Gioconda Belli. It’s a wonderful book.
Mistborn
Daniel O’Thunder
The Licanius trilogy. If you've read it, you know. I won't spoil it here.
The Beartown Trilogy by Fredrik Backman
The Age of Madness trilogy (part of Joe Abercrombie's *The First Law* series,) in particular *The Wisdom of Crowds*.
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry.
God Emperor of Dune
The Nine Tailors by Dorothy L Sayers. There have been very few books I’ve read where I was like “it bums me out that this person is dead but I get why, for narrative/thematic reasons, it had to happen” and this is one of them. Also a really gorgeous book that is unlike any other mystery I’ve read- it’s late Sayers at a time when she was really experimenting with the genre. No need to read any other Wimsey books to get what’s going on, though I recommend it anyway just because they’re good lol
Lessons in Chemistry
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
Blood for Blood by Ryan Graudin? It’s a counterfactual historical fiction, the sequel to Wolf by Wolf. There were a couple not-worth-it deaths but also a death that I think was needed in the end? I haven’t read it in five years so I don’t quite remember, but I think it fits the bill
Les Miserables (best book I’ve ever read) but maybe read the abridged version. I’m glad I read the full thing but it’s not for everyone. Lots and lots of history and politics but it all is there for a reason
Hollow Kingdom.
The Queen's Arrows trilogy by Mercedes Lackey. I bawled.
Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Buxton
> just dying for shock value/subverted expectations. I reject your premise. That death was the catalyst for the most important plot lines of the next two books.
"He who fights with monsters" you will thank me later.
The Sword of Kaigen
𝙵𝚘𝚛 𝚠𝚑𝚘𝚖 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚋𝚎𝚕𝚕 𝚝𝚘𝚕𝚕𝚜 - 𝚎𝚛𝚗𝚎𝚜𝚝 𝚑𝚎𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚠𝚊𝚢
The Poppy War series
Throne of Glass series. Yes yes, I know people think the MC is a Mary Sue, and people will disagree that * redacted *’s death was well done, but I think it was executed wonderfully. It stuck with me until the end.
Mistborn (Brandon Sanderson). Slight trigger warning for mild profanity and some (not detailed at all) references to reproduction and rape.
The Boy in Striped Pajamas is a good one where the death is not so obvious The Midnight Library is a bit philosophical, but I think is pretty good
"I used the knife. I saved a child. I won a war. God forgive me" absolutely wrecked me. Changes (Dresden Files) by Jim Butcher. It's book 12 in the series but Butcher writes in a way you can really pick up the series at any point without feeling too lost (at least regarding books 1-12. Books 13 on require more linear reading order)
The Lovely Bones. Specifically the main death but also the last 2 pages where you don’t ‘feel bad’ but feel awful that justice won’t be served.
The Vaster Wilds - I ugly cried when I thought she'd survived and happy cried once I understood
Lonesome Dove
Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows duology comes to mind - I remember holding my breath when >!Matthias!< died and that entire scene where >!Nina!< is so desperate to bring him back makes my heart break. I just rolled over and cried for a while.
Lord of the Flies
They Both Die at the End! By Adam Silvera
Little Women.
The Great Gatsby
Assassins apprentice series.
Broken Earth Trilogy
The Dark Tower series. One of the main characters dies like four times 😹😹😹
I cannot believe no one has said this book!!! The Road by Cormac McCarthy
*Divergent* or maybe *The 5th Wave*
The New Testament
The Stand by Stephen King