Tuesday's Inspiration - More on endings ala Phyllis A. Whitney

There is so much advice in this essay written years ago that I'm taking a bit more from this prolific writer. This bit is about wrapping things up without doing the after chapter where the characters sit down and explain everything that happened. Used to happen in mysteries but I've also seen it in romances. This is about wrapping up all the loose ends.

"The idea is to explain as much as possible well in advance, yet still hold something the reader is eager to know."

For me this is done in the final run through of the story. What little things haven't I explained or solved for the reader. Sometimes this is hard, especially when I'm writing a mystery since there are often those red herrings that haven't been solved before the big reveal.

Writers want the reader to read breathlessly to the end and what I call the "summming up" segment will often bore them. This isn't a good way to lead the reader to other stories that will follow or those that have been penned by a writer before this story.  So look at your story and see those problems and situations that no longer impact the "big reveal" and clear them up before that final scene where the hero and the heroine come together, or the murderer is revealed. That leaves time to make that final scene sing so the reader will want to read more stories. Save the big moment for the last paragraph.

I'm working on a story now that much is explained in the next to last chapter and the bad guy is revealed but that's not what the story is about. It's about 2 people who loved years ago and how they realize that each other is what they need in their lives forever. Their changes must be shown and the reader must believe this will be a "happily ever after" story. Working on that now.

Tuesday's Inspiration - Phyllis A. Whitney - Endings

During my teens and into my adulthood I read many of Phyllis A. Whitney's novels. When I picked up a book of essays by many authors, I read one of hers that struck a real note with me. I remember reading this years ago and put the advice in a note I was compiling about writing. This was about endings to the story. Yje gist was to leave your readers satisfied. A happy ending isn't actually necessary but the reader should be left with a feeling that this was the right ending to the particular story.

Those of us who write in the many genres are used to producing happy endings. The hero and heroine are together. The villain is being punished. Sometimes this happy ending isn't the right ending to the story but the ending should satisfy the intent of the story. The long drawn out ending where the writer spends pages explaining the entire story as a recap may make the reader scratch his or her head. This kind of ending has been used in mysteries written in the past and doesn't work today.

What if the ending is unhappy and there are those that are. I once had a reviewer really like the book but the lack of a happy ending troubled her. But because of the hero and heroine's cultural background they couldn't be together happily every after. What I wrote was a satisfactory ending with the promise they would see the other again with the hope that there would be a future for them.

Another thing that will lead to an ending that isn't completely satisfactory is letting some of the strings od the story remain unresolved. Not this can happen when one is writing a trilogy or a series. A writer must write a satisfactory ending that shows the story isn't over and there's more to come. I call this the tease ending. This meand the current story has ended but the reader will look forward to the next one in the story.

There are also times when the happy ending of a story seems forced. To me this often happens when the writer adds a postlogue that takes place in the future that shows the characters in a scene saying, "See this is a happy ending." As a reader I am usually turned off by this kind of ending.

What's your take on this? Are happy endings necessary for a story to end or should the ending be satisfactory? To quote Phyllis A. Whitney "If you keep in mind where you are going from the beginning, you will be likely to leave a satisfied reader at the end."