The Ending of The Rebel Prince

SPOILERS FOR THE REBEL PRINCE: DON’T READ IF YOU DON’T WANT TO BE SPOILED!

You’re sure?

OK.

So I got a note this morning from a lovely reader in the US who asked me why I’d chosen to end the trilogy the way I did (with a ‘five years later’ epilogue following straight after a scene of intense action) It’s not something I get asked often, but it is something I have been asked before, so I figured I might as well make my answer public

Dear ()

It just felt right that way  I wrote it many different ways – with Razi & Wyn operating on Albi and Chris. With Sól mourning Hally  and protecting Mary. But in the end it always felt better that the reader themself  picture those scenes. The aftermath wasn’t as important to the focus of the story I wanted to tell. To me the story I’d needed to tell had been what happened during the meeting with Razi,  Wyn & Jon and then the terrible attack which followed. The attack is the culmination of all the misunderstandings and distrust which happened during the trilogy, but I felt the epilogue was what was needed in order to round the whole thing off – as that is Wyn’s reward and the results of all her hard work and determination during the trilogy.

Does that make sense?

(PS: a person once wrote to me and said ‘you got tired and just wanted to finish it quickly.’ I confess this hurt. Not because they haven’t the right to feel what they want about the ending – that of course is a reader’s prerogative – but because this misconception dismisses the amount of work and thought which went into it. The ending is such because I fashioned it that way out of choice. I wrote such a lot which I then cut because it felt better to me that way. That isn’t laziness, it’s making a choice to dump months of work because in your heart you feel the story is better told without it  )

*******

And that’s the answer

OK, back to the grind stone.