Wow, that is just terrible! In an odd way (and I think it's probably the "betrayal of the reader" thing) it reminds me of My Sister Lives on the Mantlepiece, which is the only book I've ever physically thrown. Basically it's about a young boy whose teenage sister has died, and the boy has a cat, and OBVIOUSLY the loss of a big sister isn't enough suffering because the cat dies and everything is awful and I don't know or care how it ended. Like, we know loss is a terrible and all-pervading aspect of life, but jesus, couldn't you have left the kid his cat?