Endings are Important

To me, a story's ending is extremely important. Call me sentimental, if you will, but I prefer not just a good outcome to a story, but a happy one. Or at least an ending that leaves me feeling good. I hate stories that leave me feeling lousy. I don't want to invest my time reading a story or watching a movie or TV show that leaves me feeling like crap. When that happens, I find myself wishing I never spent the time reading or watching that story. I think it sucks for a writer to do that. Meaning leaving his audience feeling like crap.

The movie Gladiator for instance. Russell Crowe's character wins over the crowd, kills the evil emperor, and retains the love of the female lead, but then he dies. That sucked. Even though he accomplished every goal the movie had for him to accomplish, the dude dies in the end. You feel good about the objectives being met, but you feel like crap that the guy dies anyway. It's almost like it didn't matter that he killed the emperor or won the adoration of the crowd, and the woman loves him. He's dead!

Another story that pissed me off was Stephen King's The Mist. After a harrowing experience dodging monsters from another dimension in some kind of heavy fog, five survivors decide to commit suicide, thinking there was no way out of the mist. They had a gun, but there were only enough bullets to kill four of them. So the shooter kills everyone but himself. Then, a few minutes later, the  mist clears, and here comes the U.S. military to the rescue. The day is saved, but wait. If the people had waited just a few more minutes, their lives would have been saved, too. It left the audience feeling like crap. I don't watch shows to feel like crap. It sucked. And I ended up hating that story.

You can bet every one of my stories has a good ending. And none of them make you feel like crap. Both Killer books end perfectly and so does The Vase. As for Second Chance, I play no games with the reader. It begins letting the reader know how it ends. The story is how he got there. It's the only story that really doesn't have a happy ending, but like I said, it's set up that way from the start.

As for John Dunn. That one is a true story. It had to end the way it did, which wasn't too happy for the Zulus, but that was real life. It's real history. John Dunn's end to the story was as good as it could have been considering the circumstances. It was forced upon him by the British and he made the most of it. He was a rational man, and he did what he had to do for his family to survive. And what a family he had. Fifty wives and over a hundred kids, as well as a few thousand dependents were counting on him. He came through for them all. It doesn't end leaving the reader feeling like crap.

It's what I believe a story should be. All my stories end the way stories should end. The reader feels good, or at least, not feeling like crap. As for the other stories I mentioned, I wish I never heard of them. Especially The Mist. It sucked.