Andy Free's Blog - Posts Tagged "plotting"
Pros and Cons of Changing a Published Book's Ending
In the historical publishing industry, before the eBook (and in particular before Amazon Kindle), it must have been very onerous to make changes to a published book. So if bad reviews occurred, an author probably would not change a book in response. With eBooks, though, there is a paradigm shift that an author can use to make book writing more interactive with readers.
The really odd thing is, that in some ways this harks back to early verbal storytelling, when bards, poets, or tellers of tales could and would change stories on the fly to suit the audience – hence the vast profusion of varying stories (such as fairy tales or folklore) with similar themes or characters. Of course, I am not suggesting the eBook makes that kind of frequent change possible or desirable, but it does make some changes relatively easy, and then the question is, should the author make the change or not?
My second novel (first published novel) is Avalon: Companions, a science fiction thriller set in present day Arizona and an alternate world called Avalon. In general, reviews so far have been quite positive, but one reviewer was critical of the ending, saying it was a cliffhanger and complaining that it left the reader without enough closure on the first book’s story. My original thought behind the ending was that it was a clever plot twist that was consistent with the historical background I had given throughout the novel. The book ended where it did, I thought, because the plotlines of Book 2 made it too complex to bring anything additional into Book 1 without making Book 1 much longer than made sense. To be clear, the situation the hero was in as part of the Book 1 cliffhanger, when resolved in Book 2, was going to be a huge conflict in Book 2 with many plot streams feeding into it.
As I thought about the reviewer’s comment, I realized I agreed. From the readers’ perspective, it is not entirely fair to get them emotionally invested in characters and then leave the readers hanging with a clever but unsatisfying ending. The critical reviewer then went on to say that I used this cliffhanger approach “just to sell another book.” Since the book is only $0.99 as a get-acquainted sale price, I felt like commenting on his review: “Yes, and I am laughing all the way to the bank clutching my ill-gotten $0.35 (my share of the proceeds)! Mwa ha ha ha ha ha!” So his comment on the cliffhanger itself was fair, but his overly cynical analysis of why I did it was not.
It took a few days of thought to see if I could somehow extract something from Book 2 (as yet unpublished) to make the ending of Book 1 better and provide more closure. Fortunately, I was able to do that, and interestingly, I think the change will not only benefit Book 1 but Book 2 as well, by decoupling some plot streams that were too tightly tied to a specific situation in Book 2. This was a learning experience for me as a new author, in several ways:
1) I forgot to think about the reader’s perspective, and in particular, their likely emotional state at the end of Book 1. I got so caught up in my storyline I forgot the audience. Oops.
2) Being an “expressive” personality (in the social styles sense) means I am prone to getting caught up in dreams, visions, and stories. This is good. It also makes me forget the audience sometimes by getting too caught up in the dream and my evocation of it. That part is bad.
3) I let plotting overcome characterization and story outcome. What I mean is, story outcome (the hero’s story, the resolution of Book 1) should have come first, leading to effective character portrayal, with plotting coming a distant third. But it’s easy to get caught up in the mechanics of writing and lose sight of these priorities.
So now that I had my new ending (about 6,000 additional words), how would I make the change? In my case, I had two editions of Book 1 already (for various reasons). I didn’t want to create a third edition. This is where the eBook is such a convenient platform for an author that does want to make changes to an already-published book. My comments here mostly center around Amazon’s approach. My 2nd Edition, Avalon: Companions (Book 1 of the Avalon Series), is published via Kindle Direct, so all I had to do was update the interior text and (for other reasons) the cover image, and the change took effect over the next few days. I also asked the publisher for the 1st Edition to update across all retailers. The only problem this left me with was what to do about readers who had bought the older version – how would I get them the new ending? I have been emailing it where possible, and also have put alerts within the book descriptions and on my author web site at http://www.andybfree.com/books.html and have a free download link there for a PDF of the new ending (of course, this has major spoilers): https://digioh.com/em/23486/112784/4j... (this link goes to a secure file storage company called “Digioh” that is one of my third party providers).
But I sort of skipped ahead to the solution. Are there any reasons I might not have wanted to make the change? I can think of several:
1) It could make it look like I am vacillating as an author and not confident. Okay, but in this case I agree with the critical reviewer. I blew the first rendition ending in a way that might unnecessarily irritate many readers. So I should fix it.
2) It could confuse readers as the different editions are in flux. (Hence the need for communication and planning as noted above).
3) For plot elements that are truly a structural change, I run the risk of confusing myself as I finish Book 2. Any author knows how hard it is to keep track of a complex plot. Making last minute changes to the prior book in the series can be very tricky. In this case, I was just plain lucky – my last minute change to Book 1 will not make Book 2 harder, it will make it easier by decoupling some plot streams and making a very tricky timing problem for one of the Book 2 plot climaxes go away. I still do have a bit of an issue with a time travel sequence that will be, in essence, like a very long flashback for two of the characters, but I think I can make it work.
What Do Readers Think?
So let me open it up to the court of public opinion. What do Goodreads readers think of such ending changes to published books? Was I being courageously responsive to criticism or caving in to an Internet troll? (The critical review was quite mean and biased in some ways – so I had some justification to blow it off entirely).
More specifically, for those willing to read the book, did I get it right with the new ending? I have not by any means, even with the new ending, tied up all the loose ends of Book 1 – it intentionally portrayed several plot streams that only get resolved later, much like events in real life.
Avalon: Companions
The really odd thing is, that in some ways this harks back to early verbal storytelling, when bards, poets, or tellers of tales could and would change stories on the fly to suit the audience – hence the vast profusion of varying stories (such as fairy tales or folklore) with similar themes or characters. Of course, I am not suggesting the eBook makes that kind of frequent change possible or desirable, but it does make some changes relatively easy, and then the question is, should the author make the change or not?
My second novel (first published novel) is Avalon: Companions, a science fiction thriller set in present day Arizona and an alternate world called Avalon. In general, reviews so far have been quite positive, but one reviewer was critical of the ending, saying it was a cliffhanger and complaining that it left the reader without enough closure on the first book’s story. My original thought behind the ending was that it was a clever plot twist that was consistent with the historical background I had given throughout the novel. The book ended where it did, I thought, because the plotlines of Book 2 made it too complex to bring anything additional into Book 1 without making Book 1 much longer than made sense. To be clear, the situation the hero was in as part of the Book 1 cliffhanger, when resolved in Book 2, was going to be a huge conflict in Book 2 with many plot streams feeding into it.
As I thought about the reviewer’s comment, I realized I agreed. From the readers’ perspective, it is not entirely fair to get them emotionally invested in characters and then leave the readers hanging with a clever but unsatisfying ending. The critical reviewer then went on to say that I used this cliffhanger approach “just to sell another book.” Since the book is only $0.99 as a get-acquainted sale price, I felt like commenting on his review: “Yes, and I am laughing all the way to the bank clutching my ill-gotten $0.35 (my share of the proceeds)! Mwa ha ha ha ha ha!” So his comment on the cliffhanger itself was fair, but his overly cynical analysis of why I did it was not.
It took a few days of thought to see if I could somehow extract something from Book 2 (as yet unpublished) to make the ending of Book 1 better and provide more closure. Fortunately, I was able to do that, and interestingly, I think the change will not only benefit Book 1 but Book 2 as well, by decoupling some plot streams that were too tightly tied to a specific situation in Book 2. This was a learning experience for me as a new author, in several ways:
1) I forgot to think about the reader’s perspective, and in particular, their likely emotional state at the end of Book 1. I got so caught up in my storyline I forgot the audience. Oops.
2) Being an “expressive” personality (in the social styles sense) means I am prone to getting caught up in dreams, visions, and stories. This is good. It also makes me forget the audience sometimes by getting too caught up in the dream and my evocation of it. That part is bad.
3) I let plotting overcome characterization and story outcome. What I mean is, story outcome (the hero’s story, the resolution of Book 1) should have come first, leading to effective character portrayal, with plotting coming a distant third. But it’s easy to get caught up in the mechanics of writing and lose sight of these priorities.
So now that I had my new ending (about 6,000 additional words), how would I make the change? In my case, I had two editions of Book 1 already (for various reasons). I didn’t want to create a third edition. This is where the eBook is such a convenient platform for an author that does want to make changes to an already-published book. My comments here mostly center around Amazon’s approach. My 2nd Edition, Avalon: Companions (Book 1 of the Avalon Series), is published via Kindle Direct, so all I had to do was update the interior text and (for other reasons) the cover image, and the change took effect over the next few days. I also asked the publisher for the 1st Edition to update across all retailers. The only problem this left me with was what to do about readers who had bought the older version – how would I get them the new ending? I have been emailing it where possible, and also have put alerts within the book descriptions and on my author web site at http://www.andybfree.com/books.html and have a free download link there for a PDF of the new ending (of course, this has major spoilers): https://digioh.com/em/23486/112784/4j... (this link goes to a secure file storage company called “Digioh” that is one of my third party providers).
But I sort of skipped ahead to the solution. Are there any reasons I might not have wanted to make the change? I can think of several:
1) It could make it look like I am vacillating as an author and not confident. Okay, but in this case I agree with the critical reviewer. I blew the first rendition ending in a way that might unnecessarily irritate many readers. So I should fix it.
2) It could confuse readers as the different editions are in flux. (Hence the need for communication and planning as noted above).
3) For plot elements that are truly a structural change, I run the risk of confusing myself as I finish Book 2. Any author knows how hard it is to keep track of a complex plot. Making last minute changes to the prior book in the series can be very tricky. In this case, I was just plain lucky – my last minute change to Book 1 will not make Book 2 harder, it will make it easier by decoupling some plot streams and making a very tricky timing problem for one of the Book 2 plot climaxes go away. I still do have a bit of an issue with a time travel sequence that will be, in essence, like a very long flashback for two of the characters, but I think I can make it work.
What Do Readers Think?
So let me open it up to the court of public opinion. What do Goodreads readers think of such ending changes to published books? Was I being courageously responsive to criticism or caving in to an Internet troll? (The critical review was quite mean and biased in some ways – so I had some justification to blow it off entirely).
More specifically, for those willing to read the book, did I get it right with the new ending? I have not by any means, even with the new ending, tied up all the loose ends of Book 1 – it intentionally portrayed several plot streams that only get resolved later, much like events in real life.
Avalon: Companions
