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Given last week’s post looked at Starting a Piece of Fiction, I thought it would be apt to write about ending the said piece of fiction. The beginning of a story has to set up interesting characters and a good premise to hook the reader in, but the ending must deliver on this.
Nobody wants a story “let down”. For one thing, it will mean any other stories you produce may well remain unread by anyone else. People won’t risk a second “let down” by an author so the pressure is on writers to get this part of a story as compelling and interesting as the opening.
I’ve found the following useful and hope you will do too.
When You Know The Ending First
I sometimes know the ending of my flash fiction tales and short stories first, especially where there is a twist ending and/or a humorous punchline. I then work out what could lead to this point.
The advantage of this is it means I know my twist ending and/or humorous punchline has a strong foundation to it. Stories do (and must) have their own internal logic so by working out what would lead to the natural reveal of this twist or punchline, I have my foundation in place. Readers also don’t feel cheated here either. Everything leads to what will be, to them, an inevitable conclusion.
I see doing this as plotting from B to A rather than the usual way around and I understand Agatha Christie did this too so I am in pretty good company here.
I certainly recommend that, if you have an idea for an ending, jot it down (or you will forget it, no prizes for guessing how I know this). Then brainstorm the point immediately leading to it, then the one before that and so on. Before you know it, you will have a rough outline which you can amend as you see fit but you will have a good strong ending, backed up by a good story leading to it. Win-win.
I suppose writing to a restricted word count form (especially flash fiction) does “force” focus on me. Especially for the sub-500 words stories I write, I know I must focus on one character and one moment in time. In my outlining, I know what that moment in time must be, which helps me create the appropriate ending.
Sometimes too there are closing line competitions or those which give you a line to insert somewhere into the story and where you feel it may work best as the conclusion so it isn’t a bad idea to practice for these. I brainstorm every so often. I use these sessions for coming up with title ideas but also for opening/closing lines.
It is often the case a great opening line would also work well as a concluding one. But in brainstorming lines like these, when you come back to them later, if they still have an impact on you, then it is a good indicator the idea is a good one and is well worth your writing it up. And you will have an idea for a potential ending already!
Themes in Competitions
I do sometimes find a set theme immediately triggers an idea for an ending so I jot down my thoughts here before going on to write the story up. For a love theme, for example, my first decision will be over whether the ending will be a happy one or not. Crime stories usually need an ending where the criminal doesn’t get away with it.
But just because you know how the story is likely to pan out doesn’t mean there will be any less tension or drama as you draft your story leading up to that ending. Indeed, I find it encourages me to make my ending stronger because I know how it will be and I want to wring every part of tension and drama from it for the reader’s benefit. I guess it is the writing equivalent of “lining your ducks up in a row” but it is a useful thing to do.
I also want my characters to stand out enough to grab my readers’ attention, of course, so they will want to find out what happens to those characters so they will get to what will be a good ending. (Not necessarily good for the characters, mind you, but appropriate for the story and the situation).
Knowing What You Like in a Story Ending
This is where reading widely helps you as you write your own stories. I know what I expect to see in an ending for a specific genre. I also know when I read stories where I feel the ending has been a let down. I look back at these and figure out why it didn’t work for me. You can learn a lot doing that.
But when a story ending takes my breath away, when I feel it couldn’t have been written in any other way, I know I want that effect for my own story endings. Again, I study what the other author has done here and try and learn from it.
Three Act Structure
Most stories, of whatever length, do follow a rough three act structure. There must be a beginning, a middle, and an end and all three components need to be strong. No saggy middles here! It pays to have a rough idea of what will form your beginning, what that must lead to so you have your middle, and from there what the ending will be.
I find knowing who my character is and what they are likely to be capable of does give me a rough plan to follow for ensuring I do have a good start, a promising middle, and an ending which delivers on the story premise. I know the kind of endings my characters are likely to face.
Conclusion
It was Elmore Leonard who advised writers to “skip the boring bits” and a good story ending will be anything but boring. So why not practice writing lines which could pack a powerful punch as a story ending? Then work out what could lead to that as I mention above. It’s a good practice to get into for all short form fiction writers.
I sometimes use the random generators to trigger ideas for stories. For this post, I triggered a random line and the following came up.
He was older than she’d thought he would be.
Now that was from a random opening line generator, but I see no reason why that couldn’t be a promising ending to a story too. The job then would be to work out how he and she are and why the being older than thought matters here. But there is a rough outline for you already (a promising start to a story as I discussed last week and with an ending already there for you).
Happy writing!
Related Posts:-
Read interviews with Chandler’s Ford writer Allison Symes: Part 1 and Part 2.
Read blog posts by Allison Symes published on Chandler’s Ford Today.
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