Saddest story ever told

A friend lent me Sword at Sunset, which is a retelling of the Arthurian legends.  I’ve been plowing doggedly onwards, trying to get through it, but I have now given up.  It’s not that it’s poorly written, or anything like that - I just can’t take it.  Perhaps for the same reason that I am always happy when Darcy and Elizabeth finally end up together in Pride and Prejudice, I am always depressed by the Arthurian legends.  Even though I know what’s coming.  I just can’t get through any of the retellings.  (Except for one: Guy Gavriel Kay’s Fionavar Tapestry trilogy, which doesn’t really count as he manages a happy ending.) I want to read them, really I do, because I know that the Arthurian legends are amongst the richest mythological traditions, but there is just so much pain and despair and treachery built into them that I can’t.  ::sigh::