Ernest Hemingway: "About what Hurts"

Things that hurt really hurt. So writing about those
things should naturally be accurate, right?

"Write hard and clear about what hurts."

~Ernest Hemingway

    The first thing that comes to my mind when I think of things that hurt is death.
    That's a difficult subject to write about, isn't it? Because it's a touchy, sensitive thing that many people go through; and the last thing we would want to do is misrepresent its effects in our writing--or worse, misuse it just to make the story more dramatic.
    I once read a book that did just that (though I won't name names). Near the end of the story, the main character's best friend dies. And a couple chapters later in the final battle, the best friend's sibling also dies with long-winding last words, which pushes the main character into a very palpable fury/grief that (naturally) gives her the strength to destroy the enemy. Those character deaths were infuriating not just because it came off as cliché, and not just because it seemed awfully convenient, but because it was so unnecessary. Both of those characters didn't have to die--the sibling, at least, could have lived on and overcome his grief--but they were offed as if it was exactly what they were meant for, like the only reason those characters existed was to make the protagonist feel gutted in that one moment. The dramatic air around the losses was also kind of obscuring the fact that death had occurred; it made what happened seem unrealistic, and easily forgettable once the book is closed.
    However, in Kiera Cass's The One, there's a scene that doesn't make that kind of mistake, and lines up perfectly with what Ernest Hemingway is advising in his quote. In one of the last major scenes (SPOILER ALERT!), there's a surprise attack by the vicious rebels, and in the chaos and carnage, a lot of secondary characters are killed. It was a really gut-wrenching plot twist (and personally, I thought a few too many characters we've come to care about were lost), but in the scene's context, a high death toll makes a lot of sense. If the enemy had attacked so directly, and only nameless wallflowers (or nobody at all) had been harmed, the story would have totally lost the realistic element the author had created so artfully in the series. Plus, the shock and sadness that the scene prompts is exactly what a person should feel when they hear about such an event. Kiera Cass didn't gloss over anything; she made the bitterness of death bitter, and gave the topic of death the solemn recognition it deserves.
    Have you ever just stopped because a book is so good (or not good) at portraying the gravity of hard, hurtful things in life? Have you ever gotten really stressed about portraying death in a story as realistically as possible?