They All Lived Happily Ever After
Some People Lived Happily Ever After
One Person Lived An Okay Life For a Brief Period of Time
Great Expectations*
It’s tempting to resort to a cliché and compare great endings to pornography. Theoretically, where both are concerned, you know it when you see it. But, of course, it’s more complicated than that. For me, a rewarding conclusion is one that fulfills the work’s initial premise and promise. When that doesn’t happen, I feel cheated. Like a jilted lover or the purchaser of damaged goods, I want a do-over. At the very least, I want my money back.
In many of my favorite works, the drama and suspense culminate in a scene that’s set in motion from the opening lines. No one who reads Pride and Prejudice doubts that Elizabeth will wed Darcy. That universally acknowledged truth is made clear from the beginning. A happy ending is central to the premise of all marriage-plot books, and if the story ended in heartbreak, it would both disappoint and baffle readers. Tragedies inspire a very different set of expectations but a similar dependence on them. Though we grieve over the fate of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare gives us fair warning that a pair of star-crossed lovers will take their life. Doesn’t get any clearer than that, and however much we might hope those passionate and reckless teenagers live to a ripe old age, the opening proclamation tells us this won’t happen.
Bad Breakups
Endings that disappointed many fans (though by no means all) include Seinfeld, The Sopranos, and The Giver. They inspired a storm of criticism that could be explained by the audience’s unrealistically high expectations, but I suspect there was more to it than that. In each, there was an ambiguity, a sense that the story was unfair to—even unworthy of—its characters. The last episode of Seinfeld is humorless. The last scene of The Sopranos is an abrupt blackout. Lois Lowry’s The Giver strands its protagonist on a literal and metaphoric downhill slide, and there’s no final step in this hero’s journey.
Plenty has been written to defend those controversial choices, to justify, analyze, and explain them. Ferocious dissents from fellow English teachers still ring in my ears.
I hear you. And I respect you. But I’m not buying it. For this reader/viewer, the endings failed on a visceral level that all the intellectualizing in the world can’t adequately address. And that includes explanations from the writers themselves. A good argument can be made that art is subjective, and the creators presumably accomplished the goals they set for themselves. Perhaps the very fact that those endings continue to gnaw at me is proof of their success. (But I’m still not buying it.)
Miss Scarlet, in the Conservatory, with a Knife
Crime fiction ups the ante, where endings are concerned. For me, a successful resolution lays out a logical conclusion that at the same time surprises the reader with twists, turns, and reversals. A trusted ally turns out to be the villain? I’m all in, as long as evidence of that hidden treachery precedes the final scene. Well-placed clues, including those masked as red herrings, invite armchair detectives to actively engage in the fictional investigation. Even better, cleverly plotted mysteries that play fair with the reader inspire a second or third read.
The endpoint of a fictional detective’s journey isn’t necessarily limited to solving a puzzle. If a heroine who is afraid of heights crawls onto a ledge to save herself or someone she loves, that’s a narrative arc that satisfies. Perhaps the protagonist is, in a bit of metafictive sleight-of-hand, a crime fiction fan. The characters draw inspiration from fiction, and so do we. She faced her deepest fears. Maybe I can, too.
I write traditional mysteries but there’s no getting around the fact that even the sunniest stories will end with the delivery of retributive justice that often includes the death of the culprit. The resolution may be sober, but it can’t violate the setup. The protagonist will live to fight another day.
And That’s a Wrap
Writing those final chapters is tough. Crime fiction conventions require writers to answer every question and tie up every loose end. Readers rely on us to unveil means, motive, and opportunity without sinking them under the weight of too much explanation. There’s a lot riding on hitting the right balance, especially for writers of series. The end has to whet the reader’s appetite for more, resolving the central problem but leaving the door open for future complications.
Which endings delighted or disappointed you? Which would you change if you could?
*A Side Note About Charles Dickens and Those Supposedly Great Expectations
Dickens fans may question my use of his [ironic] title for this post. Unlike nearly all his other works, Great Expectations has a decidedly ambiguous ending. Technically, it has two endings. He rewrote the final chapter after readers complained the original was too bleak. If you are a fan of irony [as well as Dickens], you’ll give me a pass on this one.
Lori Robbins
Her experiences as a dancer, teacher, writer, and mother of six have made her an expert in the homicidal tendencies everyday life inspires.
You can find her at lorirobbins.com
You wrote that the opening of a book creates an expectation—a type of promise to the reader—and that we feel cheated when the ending breaks that promise. That resonated with me. A popular woman’s fiction author killed off her main character at the end of one of her novels. That came as such a bait-and-switch surprise to me that I actually threw the book across the room in frustration when I finished it. I thought I’d been reading a story about a character who would survive and thrive despite her challenges, and I’d been cheering that character on for 300 pages.
Exactly. The ending not only cheated you, it didn’t do right by its character. For me, the worst part of a disappointing/unfair conclusion is that it alters my relationship to the entire book. If the ending is satisfying, I’ll enjoy the story many times over.
I wonder if you and I read the same book, Mally. I hated that I had invested all that time and energy in this character’s story only to have the author kill her off in the last few pages of the novel.
I’ve been reading about Louisa May Alcott lately and she felt strongly that she did not want Jo to marry Laurie at the end of little women although she was under a lot of pressure to do so. She engaged in an argument with her readers, and she won, though she did compromise a bit. Dickens also had his arguments with his readers, but how wonderful to have your reader so invested. The worst is to get to the end and not remember what happened at the beginning.
I forgot about Jo and Laurie! I love Little Women, but Laurie’s marriage to Amy always felt awkward, because Jo was his natural partner. We didn’t imagine that connection. It’s written into the text. Maybe when a writer has to argue that hard to prove herself right something’s wrong?
A bad ending– among other things, a cliff hanger, a killer who appears out of the blue at the end, or unresolved issues–will put me off an author forever. Lately, I’ve been reading lots of fantasy and some authors seem to think that because their story is multi volumes, it’s not necessary to tie up the main story line in each volume. It really frustrates me. Give me a good romance where I know a happy ending or at least a happy for now ending is guaranteed.
I’m with you on all those bad endings. I don’t mind a secondary plotline remaining unresolved over several books, but the main one? I expect a conclusion that doesn’t leave me hanging.
In re crime fiction: Your comment about killers who show up at the end made me think that this subtopic is worth its own post.
I also expect the main plotline to be resolved at the end of a book. However, the secondary plot line of a story often gives the reader an incentive to read more from that author and to delve into the next book in a series. It can also serve as a motive for the main character to move forward and continue their journey.
I agree! As a reader, I stay hooked. As a writer, that strategy makes room for real character development over multiple books.
I like happy endings–in books as well as in life. Reading is an escape for me, from a world where the good guys don’t always win. I’ll never forget as a child seeing the Disney movie, Davey Crockett. The “good guys” (for me) all died. They didn’t save the Alamo. And no one thought to even warn me. It was a betrayal of trust. That’s what I think about fiction. We ask the reader to trust us–not necessarily for a happy ending, but for the ending I promised from the beginning.
I also am a fan of happy endings, especially now. There’s plenty of injustice in the real world. I gravitate toward stories that right those wrongs.
In re Davey Crockett: When the King of the Wild Frontier died at the Alamo, it broke my heart.
I plot the twist ending almost before any other part of the book and that the one thing almost every reviewer comments on. I , for one, didn’t have an issue with the last episode of Seinfeld (it was sort of about nothing, which is the M.O. of the entire series) and I thought the ending of The Sopranos was gutsy and iconic. It definitely inspired chatter. Isn’t that what we want?
For me, the best part about the ending of The Sopranos was that it took place at Holstein’s, an iconic luncheonette and candy store about ten minutes from my house.
Plotting the twist ending is a great strategy. I always think I’ve done so, but that twist often ends up surprising me.
You get a pass on Great Expectations, Lori!
I want resolution and there to be a (kind of) justice/retribution/resolution, especially in a crime novel. If not, then I’m in the ranks of the dissatisfied. There can be a cliffhanger of some points that lead to a sequel maybe, but the original plot that promised a story we’ve followed for a few hundred pages needs to be kept.
What would I change? To this day I am annoyed at Elizabeth George for killing off Helen Lynley. I asked George why she made that choice and she said she had to keep ‘opening the story up’ in a series which for her meant either adding a new character or killing off a beloved one. And as Helen was pregnant, she added, “there are no memorable babies in literature.” I love this series but felt cheated by this one. It was more than a bomb going off; I felt it played with readers’ emotions to kill Helen right when Lynley had found happiness. Did it make for a heart-wrenching scene when he had to turn off her machine? Sure. But it also cost her a lot of readers.
Look at Peter James’s Roy Grace series (the 20th has just been published). Roy takes his time to find love after his first wife goes missing when the series starts; but eventually he finds love with a pathologist, and goes on to have two babies with her. This is “balanced,’ if indeed happiness must be, by the psychopathy of his first child, a son the missing wife raised without him, who subsequently dies. So you can balance happiness, if you must, with other choices that don’t make readers incensed.
Marni, thanks so much for sharing this story about Elizabeth George’s decision to kill Helen. Unfortunately, for me, it also killed the series, for all the reasons you’ve outlined.
Your comments made me think more about how much we connect with fictional characters as both readers and writers. We care about them.
This is such an interesting and wonderful way to put it! I have never thought about endings like this.
Too often endings let us down — but when you get a great, cathartic, perfect ending it’s so worth it.
I’ve been thinking about endings in ‘literary’ fiction vs. ‘genre’ (the quotes are there because I kind of hate those distinctions). But in literary fiction, an open or unsatisfactory ending is almost a requirement. If you give everyone a happy ending and tie all the loose ends, the literary crowd will sniff and deduct points. but in genre fiction an open ending is usually enough to earn an author 3 stars or less in a review. I prefer solid endings, where I know what happens to the characters and can envision what will happen to them down the line. It’s important!
That’s an interesting distinction, from both a reader’s and writer’s point of view.
Like you, I prefer a solid ending. But if I had to choose between one that was ambiguous and one that was disappointing, I’d go for ambiguous every time!
I like a satisfying ending to mystery novels, meaning the murderer is caught and justice is served. The puzzle has been solved. What I find challenging as a mystery writer is creating every ending in a unique manner and setting.
I know! There are only so many ways to wrap things up, especially when you want the sleuth to solve the mystery and unmask the villain in a suspenseful standoff.
You, however, could give a master class on that topic.