Tearjerkers
Here are our favorite tearjerker novels for teens in high school. These titles are classified as Teen High School (TH) and can be found in the Teen section of the library.
 
When the World Tips Over
by Nelson, Jandy

Told in alternating voices, the Fall siblings each encounter the mysterious Cassidy at integral points in their lives, helping them untangle their relationships and uncover the truth about their father's disappearance.
August and Everything After
by Doktorski, Jennifer Salvato

After graduating high school and still dealing with the tragic death of her best friend, Quinn decides to spend the summer with her aunt at the Jersey shore where she meets a musician with his own haunted past.
Even If It Breaks Your Heart
by Hahn, Erin

Determined to follow the list his late best friend left behind of things he wants him to accomplish, 19-year-old bullrider Case Michaels is led to 18-year-old Winnie Sutton, whom he ropes into competing on the rodeo circuit and becoming his friend.
A Thousand Broken Pieces
by Cole, Tillie

Traveling abroad to help other teens stricken by loss, 17-year-old Savanna, who lost her beloved sister three years before, meets Cael, who is angry after losing his older brother. Together they heal the fractured fragments of their hearts, piece by broken piece, as they fall in love.
When Haru Was Here
by Thao, Dustin

Eric, a lonely nineteen-year-old grappling with the loss of his best friend, retreats into his imagination and finds solace in a memory of a day spent with a boy named Haru.  Eric's imagination and reality blur together when he walks into a coffee shop and sees Haru.
The First to Die at the End
by Adam Silvera

With society divided by a new technology claiming to alert people on the day of their death, thousands sign up, and on day one, dozens receive their calls, including two boys destined for love until one receives the first End Day call. 
The Next New Syrian Girl
by Ream Shukairy

When their worlds collide, Khadija Shami, a sheltered Syrian American high school senior with a monstrous ego, and Leene Tahir, a Syrian refugee doing her best to survive school and family pressures while battling panic attacks, become the unlikeliest of friends. 
When We Had Summer
by Jennifer Castle

When their best friend Carly unexpectedly passes away, Daniella, Lainie and Penny, the remaining #SummerSisters, are brought back together by Carly's bucket list and work to keep her memory alive while navigating grief and loss.
As Long as The Lemon Trees Grow
by Zoulfa Katouh

Volunteering at a hospital in Syria, where she witnessed the wounded flooding through the doors, Salama manifests a physical embodiment of her fear in the form of her imagined companion and is torn between her loyalty to her country and her conviction to survive.
Remind me to hate you later
by Lizzy Mason

As Natalie grieves her best friend Jules's death by suicide, Jules's influencer mother plans to release a book about it, which causes Natalie and Jules's boyfriend to band together and expose the truth behind Jules' tragic death.
All My Rage
by Sabaa Tahir

When his attempts to save his family's motel spiral out of control, Salahudin and his best friend Noor, two outcasts in their town, must decide what their friendship is worth and how they can defeat the monsters of their past and in their midst.
The Words We Keep
by Erin Stewart

After her sister Alice was found hurting herself, Lily, who has secret compulsions of her own, learns the healing powers of art while working with a new student who was in the same treatment program as her sister.
A Year to the Day
by Robin Benway

A year after her sister Nina's death and still unable to imagine a world without her, Leo forms a friendship with Nina's boyfriend East based on their shared grief, only to discover he knows more about the accident than he is letting on.
Four for the Road
by K. J. Reilly

When seventeen-year-old Asher embarks on a road trip from New Jersey to Graceland to get revenge on the drunk driver who killed his mom, he brings along three new friends from his bereavement groups.
I Must Betray You
by Ruta Sepetys

In a country governed by isolation, fear, and a tyrannical dictator, seventeen-year-old Cristian Florescu is blackmailed by the secret police to become an informer, but he decides to use his position to try to outwit his handler, undermine the regime, give voice to fellow Romanians, and expose to the world what is happening in his country. 
The Blossom and the Firefly
by Sherri L. Smith

A talented violinist in 1945 Japan spends his final eight days before a fatal kamikaze mission in the company of a young woman who has been struggling with trauma after being buried alive in a bombing raid.
The Last Words We Said
by Leah Scheier

Nine months after Danny disappeared, his closest friends, Ellie, Rae, and Deenie, deal with their loss very differently but will have to share secrets about the night he disappeared to uncover the truth. 
We Are Not Free
by Traci Chee

Growing up together in the community of Japantown, San Francisco, four second-generation Japanese American teens find their bond tested by widespread discrimination and the mass incarcerations of people of Japanese ancestry during World War II. 
 
Instructions for Dancing
by Nicola Yoon

Experiencing visions of heartbreak and trying to understand why this is happening, Evie signs up for lessons at a dance studio, where she falls for her dance partner, forcing her to question all she thought she knew about life and love.
We Were Liars
by E. Lockhart

Spending the summers on her family's private island off the coast of Massachusetts with her cousins and a special boy named Gat, teenaged Cadence struggles to remember what happened during her fifteenth summer.

Forsyth County Public Library
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