The Perfect Ending- how do you know when to stop?

I hate endings, whether it’s the end of a book or the end of a character, they’re painful to imagine and worse to write.

You can tell when a story has reached the end, events all move to bring your main characters together at the same point. Usually, there is nothing left of the plot at this time, except for the explanation of it all, the justification for what has happened or the big reveal, where one side tells the other what has gone on and motives are all brought out. Hopefully, by this time you (the reader) have got an idea of what’s going to happen; so you are either pleased to have got it right, or pleased to have been misled and amazed that you missed the clues, the re-telling of which very often form part of the final scenes.

Hopefully, by this time you (the reader) have got an idea of what’s going to happen; so you are either pleased to have got it right, or pleased to have been misled and amazed that you missed the clues, the re-telling of which very often form part of the final scenes.

As the author, I can generally tell when it’s time to finish, in my experience, there is a natural ending in my mind and once I get there, even if I can think of more, it would often be better put into a sequel.

However, if you’re not careful, the end can be the worst part of the story, recently I’ve had two different reactions to the end of my work.

One book seems to have ended too soon for a lot of readers, they have all said that they need to know more, and so I’ve written a sequel. The intention wasn’t to short-change them, I really thought the ending was appropriate. It’s gratifying to get feedback like that; I take it to mean that I’d managed to create characters real enough that people wanted to know more about them and to care about their futures enough to want to find out what I think happened next. At first, I wondered if I should have written more, then I decided that, by stopping when I did, I had done enough.

The other book has ended in an anti-climactic way for some, although not all, readers. Apparently, I upped the tension more than the ending could take and it was all a bit flat. That is my failing and I have to hold my hands up, but in my defence, that’s how it unfolded in my head. Again, that wasn’t a universal response; other people said the ending was good.

But isn’t life like that sometimes? The culmination of an adventure or a project can be a bit of a letdown, for so many reasons. Anticipation can ruin any event. In a way, I guess, writing imitates life, the end is not always perfect, sometimes the good guys don’t win. Sad but true!

I guess that just goes to prove that every review is subjective, everyone has things that they like and dislike, I have reviews that alternately praise and criticise the same thing in a story, I’m grateful for all comments, it can be strange the things that some people like though, minor characters that attract attention or little bits of subplot that just seem to grab someone’s attention.

 

 

 

And that’s where part two comes in, the death of a character!