Why Do So Many Endings Fall Flat?

gothicangel

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This evening I finished reading a novel which I had been thoroughly enjoying until the last page. It was a crime thriller and the set-up of the climax was the hero/detective had been caught by the villain, tied up and about to be shot, then all of a sudden the SAS appear over the hill and save the day (talk about saved by the cavalry trope!) Then that was it.

Although this was a definite *facepalm*, I have been noticing this more and more in novels. You settle in for a big set-piece ending (and I'm a believer that the best part of the book should be Act 3) and the writer completely fluffs it. So why is this?
 
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Ari Meermans

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I don't know but I have a pet theory, which is basically this: The novel is well-plotted, all the boxes have been checked and there are no loose ends left for the ending—which, I think is a big part of the problem—and the novelist sees the end in sight and rushes toward it. This leaves the reader with an unsatisfactory denouement. A loose end or three should (maybe) have been left for the last scenes and more passion/emotion (or, I don't know, maybe danger or a twist) should have been left for the last quarter or so of the novel.

A lot has to do with the expectations the writer has built in the reader and I don't think even experienced writers are completely immune to the rushed ending.

Again, that's just my pet theory.
 

PyriteFool

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Oh man, I have *feelings* about endings. At least for me a bad ending can ruin a story telling experience that I had previously been enjoying (that may be extreme on my part but I will die on this hill). Buckle in for a rant!!

I think unsatisfying endings come down to a couple of things:

- not fulfilling the promises made either explicitly or implicitly at the beginning of the story (I'm stealing terms from Brandon Sanderson's lectures, but I think this sums it up the best).
- ending didn't tie back to the MC's growth or story's themes. I think these are the ones that often feel "unearned"
- ending was "too easy". It sounds like this is what happened to your thriller, OP. Unless the hero was supposed to learn they can't do it all alone, a "saved by the cavalry" ending often feels arbitrary. Lack of set up for the solution
- not enough denouement. I love the calm after the storm beat and *so many* stories skip it! Even a lot of beat sheets and craft books leave it off. It's probably the least egregious sin, and it's unlikely to "ruin" and ending, but I hate feeling like I missed something at the end. I want to see the "new normal" after the dust settles.

To be fair, endings really are difficult. They rely so heavily on everything that came before. You have to weave all the threads together, come up with a clever solution to the problem (after all if the problem were easy to resolve, there'd be no story), and oh, make it flashy too! If anything was lacking in the first 75% of the story, it's going to come back to bite you in the end. The writer also has to draw conclusions about whatever themes or character journeys were set up before. That can be tricky and occasionally fraught depending on the subject matter.

I wish I could remember who made this observation originally, but it does bear repeating that endings are often the part of a story writers get the least practice with. Beginnings? Tons of how-to's, advice, and they are easy to crit without reading a whole book. Endings not so much. A lot of projects never even get an ending if the writer trunks them! I also wonder if endings get the short end of the stick in editing because everyone is tired or time-crunched or some combination by the time they get there. Writers and editors are only human, after all. Idk, that's more speculation on my part.

Okay, rant over. Endings are tricky and arguably the most important part of a story and also the hardest to practice. Lucky us :tongue (though this does make me appreciate good endings all the more!)
 

hjrey

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I honestly think crime/thriller can be the absolute worse for endings. A lot of the disappointments I have is when the killer is revealed to be someone you were never going to guess because the character doesn't have any real motivation for why they're the killer. You get a random rant at the end on why they did what they did, but it just feels like it comes out of nowhere or like they have a complete personality transplant. I like to get a list in my head as I read of my suspect list and I don't think I always go for the obvious ones but if the real killer is not on my list I feel like the writer hasn't done a good job at leaving breadcrumbs.
 

Tepelus

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I read a book some years back, a real door stopper of a historical horror. Well, I didn't find it horrifying, but I enjoyed all of the attention to detail in the historical bits, and I could also pick out which was made up since I was/am very much into the time period and subject matter. The subject matter was what drew me to the book in the first place, and I wanted to see how the writer handled it. But the ending. Urrrrrgh! All of this build up over 600+ pages and the final battle of the baddie, who survived for hundreds of years (vampire novel), was killed just like that in a few paragraphs. The final confrontation I think lasted maybe a page. When I got past it I remember thinking, that's it? This so-called powerful being was killed so easily? Very disappointing.
 

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Sometimes writers do a bad job with tying up loose ends, too, and it seems forced and rushed. I see this a lot with YA novels. Everything has to be okay because it’s the end of the book so I’ll the sudden people have changed their minds about this or that even though nothing has happened to change their minds, or the thing the MC wasn’t able to do or didn’t work before is all the sudden okay even though nothing related to it has changed. A lot of the time the ending doesn’t feel earned.
 

Cindyt

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I read a crime thriller years ago about a deaf police detective. She communicated via Blackberry (before phones had text apps) I'm deaf too, and I really tucked into it. She solved the crime and put the bad guy away. And opened her front door. And somebody shot her to death. The End. I wanted to throw that book across the room.

All two of my books--historical love and historical crime thriller--end with a popping good scene.
 

Cephus

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This has been a thing forever and people have been noticing for just as long. It reminds me of the Neil Simon film Murder by Death, which is a fantastic comedy on its own, but the ending had the villain getting upset at the mystery writers of the day for doing a lot of what was just described. Introducing new plot elements and characters in the last couple of pages so they could wrap up the mystery without having given it away earlier in the plot. The whole point of writing mysteries and suspense thrillers is to give the reader everything they need to solve the crime, if they would just look at it the right way. It all ought to make sense in retrospect. Unfortunately, there are a lot of writers, even very successful writers, who just aren't that good at it.
 

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These days I like to have a solid ending before I start, as there's nothing more obvious than a contrived ending that ruins an otherwise fine book.

A professional author friend once told me the best endings come as a complete surprise, but in hindsight are inevitable. True, but very hard to do!
 

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I don't know but I have a pet theory, which is basically this: The novel is well-plotted, all the boxes have been checked and there are no loose ends left for the ending—which, I think is a big part of the problem—and the novelist sees the end in sight and rushes toward it. This leaves the reader with an unsatisfactory denouement.

I think another variant is “author bored with this series” syndrome. There’s a well-known fantasy writer who was huge in the 80s, with many series published, who consistently would start strong on a new series, usually a trilogy, then just kind of peter out by the last book.

And maybe “I really had no idea how to end this” syndrome. Many of Stephen King’s horror novels read like this for me. Lots of atmosphere in the early chapters, creepy stuff galore, mysterious dark forces, and then... plotz. Really? It ends like that? Oh, okay.
 

L.C. Blackwell

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I wonder if some authors may be the victims of word count limits and/or deadlines. I picked up a book a while back which was really rather nicely developed until the author slapped a few things together in the last chapter and failed to give the heroine her due in the ending department. It seemed to me as if she felt she was out of pages, and had better hurry up and end it. I was much tempted to rewrite the last chapter and glue it into my own copy of the book. Sigh....

:Shrug:
 

Woollybear

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For whatever it's worth, there are 5.8 million google hits on 'how to start a novel,' and 0.6 million on 'how to end a novel.'

Y'all made me curious.
 

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I appreciate this topic, since structure and decent endings are something I struggle with too. These days I have more compassion than disgust for writers who fail to jump the ending hurdle and come a cropper instead.

I have been weighing up whether to slap an ending, no matter how contrived and lame, on my first draft, just so I have a completed draft. But I think that would be too much of a bandaid on a mortal wound and I doubt my story would ever recover.

Back to the drawing board.
 

gothicangel

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Oh man, I have *feelings* about endings. At least for me a bad ending can ruin a story telling experience that I had previously been enjoying (that may be extreme on my part but I will die on this hill). Buckle in for a rant!!

Definitely. I had been thinking, I'll read more by this author, but now I don't think I will bother. In the same vein, a really rip-roaring ending can turn an average book into the best thing you've read in years.
 

Woollybear

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Makes me think there are blog posts just waiting to be written about how to end a novel.
 

gothicangel

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Also, my personal view is that the story/plot/action of Act 3 should involve the worst-case scenario in your MC's head, happening to your MC.
 
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Marian Perera

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Sometimes writers do a bad job with tying up loose ends, too, and it seems forced and rushed.

I see this in romances sometimes, when the writer believes the HEA has to be universal. I recently read a historical where the hero's and heroine's happy ending was earned and well-paced, but previously the hero confided that his parents blamed him for his brother's death, which was why he left home and became a loner. Lo and behold, who should appear on the penultimate page but his parents, having set out to find him because they forgave him. That was clearly just thrown in to tie up the loose end and to make it clear that everything in the main characters' lives was now 100% perfect, but for me it was just unnecessary and reminded me that I was reading a book.
 

onesecondglance

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Also, my personal view is that the story/plot/action of Act 3 should involve the worst-case scenario in your MC's head, happening to your MC.

Nah - give them what they want, in the worst possible way. :evil

Also, for me, that's the last part of act 2 - act 3 is working out how to get past that moment.
 

angeliz2k

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Endings really do make or break a story. There are plenty of stories that are only okay but are tied together and made worthwhile by a good ending.

I think the most important thing in an ending is emotional/thematic integrity. The most common problem seems to be a forced happy ending--which is about as enjoyable as forced family fun. HEA are fine--are great, in fact--but they just don't work with every story. You can probably tack a happy ending onto any story, and it might even work plot-wise, but it's going to be evident from a mile away that it just doesn't match the rest of the story. The same is true of a tragic ending (like the deaf detective mentioned above). It needs to match up with the characters and tone that have already been established. To put it in a different way: it has to be earned.

I also think it's important not to tie up all the lose ends, or at least not too neatly. In real life, there are very rarely easy or complete resolutions to every situation all at once. If everything is all neatly tied up, it gives the characters a feeling of cardboard cutouts that stop at the last page. I prefer characters who you can imagine living on after the end of the book (presuming they don't die at the end...).

And I do love a nice, long, satisfying denouement.
 

indianroads

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Does anyone (else) remember a movie from the early 70's called 'Colossus, The Forbin Project'? The story was about the US placing all our nuclear arms under the control of a super computer. Turns out that shortly after the US (AI) computer came on line the Russians did the same. The computers 'talked' to each other, and when humans broke the connection the computers fired missiles at cities. People tried to outwit the computers - but realistically that could never happen, and in the movie it didn't. Humans were under the tyrannical boot of a caring computer forever.

There was also a mid-60's movie called 'Fail Safe' that ended with the US bombing New York City to stop a nuclear war with Russia.

Were those endings satisfying? Depends on your definition. It was an ending though, and definitely left an impression.
 

BlackKnight1974

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Endings!

An ending can make a good novel great, or what was a great novel a complete letdown.

Although George RR Martin technically never wrote the finale, "Game of Thrones" was (personally) a great example of this for me. I was up to date with the books and was as excited about the final series of the TV show as I've ever been.

What followed was so disappointing. You know an ending is bad when a "happily ever after" complete with incestuous marriage is infinitely preferable to what was served up. Aside from Clegane-bowl, just about every characters ending was a let down (and don't worry, I won't list them all) and I'm not sure I'll even reading the remainder of the books (if they are ever released).

It's not that I only like predictable endings (for example, I liked the ending of "No Country for Old Men" as it proved the title), but something completely our of kilter is as bad as a damp squib.

I try and aim for a climatic ending, and then a twist/teaser in the epilogue/aftermath, although whether it works or not is not for me to say...
 

Ariel.Williams

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I see this in romances sometimes, when the writer believes the HEA has to be universal. I recently read a historical where the hero's and heroine's happy ending was earned and well-paced, but previously the hero confided that his parents blamed him for his brother's death, which was why he left home and became a loner. Lo and behold, who should appear on the penultimate page but his parents, having set out to find him because they forgave him. That was clearly just thrown in to tie up the loose end and to make it clear that everything in the main characters' lives was now 100% perfect, but for me it was just unnecessary and reminded me that I was reading a book.

Sometimes happy endings are fine, but I think this kind of thing is where it doesn’t work. The parents had nothing to do with the couple getting together, so the book didn’t solve that problem. It would be a huge coincidence for them to just show up, somehow now being when they finally find the MC. But the happy ending of the couple getting together would work because they probably spent the whole book working through their conflict.

I’m not huge into happy endings in general though, I think because I’m just jaded. But my sister is and gets super upset when I recommend her a book without a happy ending. I think she’d want a happy ending in every book, even if it was forced. ��