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I think I’ve been hearing some talk about trouble with endings recently and I thought it would be good to have a thread about it. This is all for discussing how to come up with a good ending for your story, the psychological importance of knowing your ending, discussing good examples, etc. If we all work together, we should be able to lay down some good principles.
I’ll start out with something about knowing the importance of your ending before you even start writing and probably come back and make some comments on how to do an ending later.
I probably have ten book ideas in my head right now but I’m struggling to even think of them all because I only ever really think about three. As of now, I only care about those three. Why? Because I know the endings already! I don’t know a whole lot about the plots for these books, but I have enough in place that I know the endings are going to be great. Endings are the most important thing a reader thinks about when they are evaluating a book they just read. Writers should focus on endings when considering a book they are about to write.
Actually, I will talk a little bit about coming up with an ending. One thing you can do is if you ever come across an ending you are dissatisfied with, ask yourself how you would have ended it. Of those three books ideas I’m pursuing, one of the endings came about this way. I had just read TLOTR and I was a little disappointed with the ending. *Pauses. Dons kevlar* I asked myself how I would have ended it, and I got this great idea. Now, as the idea started to develop, I dragged it out of Tolkien’s world and shoved it into my own story world and let it mature there.
Tell me all your own tricks/theories. I’ll be back in a while.
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There are no words for the awesomeness of this topic @Daeus. I can finally unload. *rubs hands, chuckles evilly*
Actually don’t worry, I don’t think I have just tons and tons of stuff to dump off on you yet. 😉
Just a few points for now. The first being that it has to be unexpected. It has to be in some way different than the reader was picturing. And yet at the same time it can’t just be completely random— there has to have been a way for the reader to predict it. They have to already be possessed of the solution when it comes— it’s just not the solution they were expecting.
Point two: the story generally (not always, but most of the time) has to be careening full tilt to its ruin when the ending is sprung and everything’s fixed. They reader should be biting their nails and bouncing nervously on the edge of their seat, fretting that there’s no way anyone can fix this mess and its all going to end in a miserable glob of… misery.
Then BANG! All fixed.Now I’ll give an example that follows both of these rules to perfection. Dickens’s Little Dorrit.
/WARNING: SPOILERS WILL FOLLOW. MY SINCEREST APOLOGIES/I actually haven’t read the book yet— but I saw the BBC movie, and they are generally very accurate.
So. The last episode opens with the male lead, Arthur Clennam, thrown into debtor’s prison after running his business partner’s (Daniel Doyce) business into the ground by a foolish investment. The female lead, Amy Dorrit, is ruined at the same time by her family’s investment in the same scheme, and having loved Arthur ever since she met him she goes to him in prison, and long story short he proposes and they admit that they love each other— something Arthur was blind to for most of the series. That plot thread was tied off— but they are both still stuck in the awful debtor’s prison that drove Amy’s father mad, without a penny between them.
At this point in the movie I was scared stiff they weren’t ever going to get out— I knew there had to be some way, but I racked my brains again and again and couldn’t think of it.Now pause there for a sec, and come with me back to one of the middle episodes. The scene is the office of Daniel Doyce’s then thriving little business. Arthur is trying to convince Doyce to go to Russia and market a special invention there, since they haven’t been able to make any headway in the English market. Doyce raises monetary objections— how will the business in England survive if he is in Russia? Then Arthur unfolds his brilliant investment plan, and on the strength of that argument convinces Doyce to go to Russia and see what he can do there. Doyce leaves.
Cut back to the last episode, where the investment has failed and Arthur is kicking himself (mentally 😛 ) for being so cocksure and ruining his friend’s business on a weak investment.
He and Amy have finally admitted that they love each other, but they’re stuck in debtor’s prison with no money to pay their way out, and Arthur is loaded with guilt.
Enter Daniel Doyce.
Back from Russia with a fortune in his pocket and a smile in his eyes. Hugely successful— ‘Doyce & Clennam’ is back in business, with more than enough money to pay their debts and make everything right again.
That is probably one of the most satisfying endings I ever experienced. Technically I could have foreseen it— but I didn’t. I was so engrossed in everything else that I forgot, until it exploded onto the screen before my eyes and I was slapping myself for not thinking of that at first. *sigh* It’s lovely.And then there’s the topic of bittersweet endings… but this post has been long enough for now.
I have a question.
Daeus.
*ominous, sinister glare*
What exactly was the problem with the ending of LotR?
I thought you would stop by here eventually @kate-flournoy.
That’s a good point how you need to make the reader tremble. The example you gave was good too. I’ve never read that book, but it sounds like the clue to the answer to the character’s problems was carefully hidden in the middle of the story. That’s smart, especially when it’s a long story. Make people forget about the important facts and then bring them up again when they’ll have effect.
The bittersweet ending often has a similarity to this. There can often be some little thing stuck in the middle like a promise made, or a nagging doubt, or a minor affection, or something that when everything seems like it is all going to end happily ever after ends up changing the whole direction of the story into that beautiful bittersweet ending.
I’m thinking about the book I just finished, Edwin Brook, and I would say it is a bittersweet ending that is done this way. There is the inner life of the character that has been developing all along and then there is this other plot twist that I bring from the depths of the early chapters to finish it all off. I’m also thinking of two other book ideas I have for bittersweet endings. One of these is the same, but the other one is where what you dread will happen really does happen. That’s another really good way to do it. The sweet part of the bittersweet there is the focus on what was won through the sacrifice and the theme itself.
That’s the biggest number 1 thing about endings right there: Theme. I need to go write now, so I can’t say everything I want to say about that right now, but let it be known that the way to develop a good ending for any story is to look at the story’s theme. I will be back
And what’s wrong with TLOTR’s ending? Well the whole destruction of the ring and restoring of Gondor was beautiful and the mount doom part was positively thrilling, and the part where the hobbits come back and take back the shire was delicious, but the part where Frodo left fell flat for me.
I think there are a couple reasons for this.
1. There was no hint that it was going to happen. It wasn’t something I could have guessed and it didn’t need to happen to make the story complete.
2. I wasn’t particularly sad to see Frodo leave because he had already completed his mission and he was happy and he wasn’t making any sacrifice and he wasn’t dying and I didn’t know much about where he was going to.
3. It had nothing to do with the themes. The big themes were mercy and courage and the ending had nothing to do with that.
4. Frodo didn’t seem too sad to leave.
5. His friends are really sad but that sadness doesn’t seem to do anything for them really or for anyone else.
6. It seemed to carry on too long. I think things should have been wrapped up quicker after mount doom. That was the whole point anyways, and everything after that is pretty much extra and driving home the theme (which Frodo’s departure didn’t do.)So yeah. That’s why I was disappointed. It wasn’t really bad, but it just wasn’t good.
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Okay @Daeus I will grant you those are all very valid points. I actually do agree— the ending of tLotR really doesn’t have near as much meaning by itself as it does if you read all the trivia and history and world-building that made that departure significant. Which is too long to go into here… 😛
A good example of the bittersweet (actually more like completely tragic) ending where the thing the reader most fears comes to pass is R. L. Stevenson’s ‘Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.’ Have you read it? It’s not a pleasant read, but it’s incredibly powerful and thought provoking, and the ending was DEFINITELY used to hammer home the theme. ‘If you tamper with things you don’t understand, and take upon yourself responsibilities no human was ever meant to bear, grief will invariably follow.’
Oh! Oh oh oh, I remembered something else I was going to say. There’s a way to take an ending that would be completely bitter and add an element of sweet into it without reducing the bitterness.
I’m thinking specifically of one of my own novels here, but there have been countless others to employ this tactic. ToTC, to name just one.
The trick is this— actually you know what, I think this applies to pretty much any ending. It’s not what happens that matters in the end— it’s the way the characters feel about it. For instance, ToTC’s ending, plotwise, was completely bitter. But Carton didn’t see it as bitter, therefore we have an added element of sweet.In my novel in question, the message is ‘There’s no such thing as a worthless sacrifice’. Practically every single character you care about in the story dies— but they were willing to die, and their deaths accomplished great things. So even though they’re dead, it’s sweet because they died defending something they believed or someone they loved, and it’s triumphant because in the end, they did win, even though they weren’t there to witness their own victory.
As I see it, the reader doesn’t care as much that the characters win so much as they care that they try.@kate-flournoy I haven’t read that Jekyll-Hyde thingy. Is it a short story or a novel?
Mmm, good point about the character controlling the feel. That really is so true. Crazy us, we can get people to fall for anything. The thing is though, it really is true, just no one would ever believe it outside of fiction. Silly us. Silly people. *eats a cookie*
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Where is everybody else? Sometimes I wonder if they have an internet filter for all the really good discussions. Tough I guess I don’t mind hogging them all. *eats another cookie*
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I don’t know where everybody else is @Daeus… but hey, I guess I don’t mind hogging it either. 😉 *eats cookie of her own, chokes, squints, eats second cookie and swallows with gulp, dusts fingers off on skirt*
I will be back with an intelligent post for this topic later. If the cookie monster doesn’t sue me first.
Oh yes, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde… actually you know, I think it’s more like a novella. I don’t remember the precise length, but it definitely wasn’t a full fledged novel. I highly recommend it.
@kate-flournoy and @daeus
*runs in* *hunches over to catch breath* What did I miss? Oh, nice topic! As I have never actually written an ending for a book (short stories excluded), I have just about no experience with this topic. However, I do think it is important that you tie up any loose ends and don’t let the reader down. If the reader was expecting something to happen, don’t disappoint him.In the end, they did win, even though they weren’t there to witness their own victory.
I agree, Kate. When you have somebody die, the reader should be sad, but you can’t just leave it there. In my opinion, there should actually be something good that comes out of the person’s death. That’s probably why I didn’t like the ending of Mockingjay. (I won’t say what happens just in case somebody hasn’t read it yet.) After something sad happens near the end of the book, Katniss is sort of hopeless. The end. There was no element of happiness after that event.
Okay, I’m done! 🙂 😉A dreamer who believes in the impossible...and dragons. (INFJ-T)
@ingridrd Oh good, you joined in on the fun.
Generally, you do want to fulfill what the reader expects. I don’t think this always needs to be the case though. In my novella, I had this guy who was probably my most prominent character who ended up deserting everybody at the end of the book and basically leaving them to die and I never say what happens to him. Now my dad still tells me that I shouldn’t have just done that and then never said anything more about him, but the few other people I have talked to who have read that story seem to like the ending. I’m keeping it the way it is because it is good for the theme. You can legitimize almost anything on the basis of what’s good for the theme. What I did emphasises my point that true loyalty is based on inward principle, not outward acts of devotion which may be redirected if the foundation is not there.
This leads me to what I wanted to say about theme. Theme is how you come up with your ending. If you think about it, not only is the end the best place to make your point, it is required. If your theme is about justice and you end your hero getting married, that just doesn’t make sense. Maybe it is something your character has really been wanting, but it ain’t gonna satisfy the reader because it doesn’t fit. Instead, have someone pay for the evil they have done, or if your book has dual themes of justice and mercy, perhaps have them be forgiven.
It isn’t that hard to find your story’s theme. Just look for what your character’s goals are and what he is up against. Is he trying to save the world but facing a powerful villain. The theme is probably courage or something similar. Is he trying to explore the world but can’t because of family issues that keep him home? The theme is probably learning to appreciate others.
So let’s take an example. We want to write this story where a girl goes on a mission to find this super rare plant that will heal her mother of some terrible disease. The problem is that along the way she falls in love with an evil faerie dragon-fly (I know. Kinda freaky. Bear with me). So she ends up going to live with this evil faerie dragon-fly in its cave in the mountains. Once there, the evil faerie dragon-fly imprisons her and forces her into slave labor. So that’s what we’ve got so far. What we need now is an ending.
Well, we have two goals from the MC so far. First is to save her mother and the second is to go live with the evil faerie dragon-fly. Now one’s obviously in conflict with the other. The conflict between these two is what drives our plot. Obviously, though, we only want to encourage the first goal. Well, we have two ways to do that. Tragedy or non-tragedy. We’ll choose non-tragedy.
So can we just have her escape now, find the plant, and heal her mother. Well, we could do that, but there’s a problem. Let’s look at our theme again. We want to show that the girl’s first goal was good and not the second. That means our theme must be something like, “True love is dedicated.”
So now, if the girl is going to be dedicated, let’s make her dedicated. Not only does the girl escape from the evil faerie dragon-fly, but she does so knowing that an army of a thousand evil faerie dragon-flies will pursue her and kill her if they find her. She finds the plant and heads back home. Along the way, she meets some honest and true person who wants to help her by hiding her away until the evil dragon-flies stop chasing her. She can’t agree though because if she waited that long, her mom might die. Therefore, she keeps going and right before she gets to her mom’s house, she is captured by the evil faerie dragon-fly army. All things look like they are about to make an end of her, but the evil faerie dragon-fly who first stole her away to the mountains has secretly been transformed by her example. He is so moved by her dedication — a dedication he has never seen before — that he risks his life and saves her (notice that this is the theme working out in him too) and brings her to her mother where she is just in time to save her.
Oh, and she lived happily ever after and ate raspberries for every meal.
The End
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@daeus
Wow; just wow. Forget what I said because what you’re saying makes a lot more sense! 😉 I agree that you shouldn’t have to fulfill all of the reader’s expectations, just some. That way you leave room for more creativity and an awesome story! By the way, I would totally read that story about the girl and the evil faerie dragonfly! It sounds pretty cool! 🙂
Okay, I’m going to call some more people over here. @gretald @belegteleri @faithdk @hope @bluejay @overcomer @his-instrument @writefury @adry_grace @hannah-olsen @rolena-hatfield @christi-eatonA dreamer who believes in the impossible...and dragons. (INFJ-T)
Thanks Ingrid. You’re totally right that you can’t end a story with even most of your strings loose. Imagine that! (it would be terrible)
I’ll spread out the cookies for when everyone arrives. ????????????
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I’ll take a cookie! It isn’t that I miss the good discussions, I guess I just feel like I don’t have anything to add, as I am hardly even a writer 🙂 I think you guys have some really good points though, especially about how the ending needs to tie into the theme and bringing up something that happened in the middle everyone forgot about. And @Daeus – I agree with Ingrid, you really should write that book.
@Daeus I would put my stamp of approval on that entire post, but I’ve had some trouble with that in the past, so I think I’ll leave it un-stamped…
Awesome post just the same. Very good points, both you and @Ingridrd.On the topic of theme and endings, I have found that working a story simply for the purpose of presenting a clear theme can be an incredible experience. I think it was C.S. Lewis who said something like ‘Don’t worry about originality. Focus on the truth, and originality will come’.
Or something like that. Anyway, I have found that to be so, so true— I used to worry about how I could make things different and not cliche— especially endings. Now I’ve started asking myself what I need to do to showcase the theme, and originality comes with pretty much zero effort. Truth is always original.Another point about endings… the stakes. They don’t always have to be the end of the world. I love stories like that, but I also love stories where the stakes are lower, yet no less important. What you build up to is what you have to give the reader, and sometimes it can be easy to think that you have to make the stakes as high and exciting as possible, but I don’t think that’s necessarily true. Whatever is important to the characters (here we are again! Those characters are some pretty useful chaps, what? 😛 ) will be important to the reader. Even if it’s just perfecting the invention of a more efficient coffee maker, so long as the character has been struggling and working through the whole story to accomplish that. Conflict is conflict and goal is goal, no matter how insignificant.
*pauses, eyes cookies* Hey… no one else has showed up yet. Can I eat one of those? Are they chocolate chip m&m?
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