Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens

Great Expectations is the story of Pip, his childhood and growth into an adult. As a poor child, growing up was rough, he never had the best of things, was in love with a girl in a station much higher than his own, and had a longing for things that always seemed out of reach. When he is a bit older, he receives and unexpected windfall of money. He moves to the city, pursues what he thought he always wanted only to find that he was too materialistic and what he had originally wanted isn't worth having anymore and the things that he truly does want don't want him back.
Most people have already read this story, and so I'll say -- the ending of this book was tragic, but it was also the only way this book could have ended, so fitting.