Discworld/Tear Jerker

Terry Pratchett's Discworld has a lot of these:

Main Discworld novels

 * Tear Jerker


 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker


 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker


 * Feet of Clay
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker


 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker


 * Night Watch
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker


 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker

Young adult novels

 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker
 * Tear Jerker

Other

 * The introduction in which Terry writes about getting letters from people who are due to meet Death, and hope that he is as Pratchett has written him. Not just any people. CHILDREN. Terminally ill children who thank Mr. Pratchet for making Death less scary for them. Let's just say Terry wasn't the only one left staring at the walls when they read that.
 * What may be the ultimate Tear Jerker for the whole Disc- the fact that Terry Pratchett is suffering of a disease that will slowly corrode him and his brilliant mind, until nothing remains of the brainpower that creates and fuels this amazing world.
 * Worse: He's made a documentary discussing the concept of assisted suicide, showing a half dozen people suffering from horrible diseases that have absolutely destroyed their bodies, yet they are just as alive and bright in mind as Pratchett himself... ...and the point of it all is explaining and showing how he plans to end his own life. Here's a link: http://vimeo.com/25239708.
 * He wrote a Dimbleby Lecture, about a year after that documentary was made. It was about euthanasia, and the single hardest thing to watch in it is him explaining that he needed his friend Tony Robinson to read out his entire speech for him, because his brain just is not capable of letting him properly read any more. The look on everybody's faces, and the obvious way Pratchett is struggling to read about a page of notes- the introduction- is heartbreaking. Making it worse is that he sits on stage afterwards, extremely dignified, as Robinson reads the speech, and the camera keeps cutting occasionally to Pratchett quietly sitting in his chair, his hat covering his face.
 * Repeatedly in witch novels: If any ground is sacred, this ground is; if any day is sacred, this day is.
 * The Sea and Little Fishes: "It’s hard to contemplate, in the grey hours of the night, that probably the only reason people would come to your funeral would be to make sure you’re dead." Granny Weatherwax can be a very heartbreaking character at times.