I posted this at the end of a 3-page exchange, which was becoming a bit tired, so I thought I'd refresh my question here...

I've got several endings for my novel and I'd like to get opinions on what generally works / sells best:

(1) a sad ending with nothing good resulting from it, and with serious concern for the future of the mc,

(2) a sad ending, (eg mc dies) but with the problem solved and goal achieved, or,

(3) a feel-good ending, problem solved and characters are content.

Michael

I don't know if you can say one works better than the others. It surely depends on the book. I can imagine all three getting positive and negative reactions. The important thing is that the ending flows naturally - but unpredictably - from the beginning, and that the reader's made to care what happens to the characters.

Hi Michael, I think its horses for courses really - it depends what you're trying to achieve and what your readers are expecting. There are examples of huge commercial and literary successes in all the categories you mention, I mean off the top of my head : Madame Bovary, resolutely sad; Wuthering heights, bitter-sweet; Pride and Prejudice, resolutely happy.

I think the success depends on the artistry and satisfaction provided by the novel, and the ending is only a small element in that.

Broadly speaking I think commercial novels tend towards more overtly "satisfying" resolutions, but you can't make a literary novel commercial by tacking a feel-good ending onto it. I don't suppose Tess of the D'Urbervilles would have sold loads more copies if Hardy had given Tess a rom com ending where she ended up having babies with Angel Clare.

Which is a long-winded way of saying I'd give it the ending you think works best and let the sales worry about themselves.

Agreed - resolved-ness is needed at the more commercial end of things, tho' whether that's happy, or sadder-but-wiser, or dashing the tears from the cheeks and embarking-on-a-new-life, or thoroughly but rightly dead, will vary and, as Leila has said, needs to flow naturally from the story.

I think that except at the most routing commercial end, though, a satisfying ending will leave some sense that something new is going to happen. For the happy-ever-after scenario, as sense that now these two are going to embark on working out how to be married, for example; for the whodunnit, the sense that all the lives which have been turned inside out by the investigation, which is now concluded, now have to embark on this new-shaped life.

I think the end which is really indeterminated is challenging for most readers - it's not what most of us read fiction for, most of the time. Although I really understand the writer's desire not to tie things up too neatly in either death or marriage... I know I read something recently which was really un-determined and I thought it was brilliant, but it was nuts-driving too: you didn't find out what the resolution was of the main plot... I'll post when I remember what it was

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except at the most routine commercial end,

Thanks for sharing your views. I know the question is a sweeping generalisation...

I'm 'swithering' between trying to achieve the biggest impact on the reader, and likeability, not necessarily the same thing. The ending of Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian had a big impact on me, although it wasn't satisfying at all, (I really wanted that Judge character to his ass kicked),as did No Country for Old Men, also by Cormac, but to a lesser extent.


Cheers
Michael

trying to achieve the biggest impact on the reader, and likeability, not necessarily the same thing.

Yes, it's a tricky balance to strike, I think... I suspect it's something where to some degree you just have to please yourself, because you're never going to please everyone. And, actually, if an editor or agent thinks the the rest of the book is stonking and just the very end is slightly off-key, with any luck they'll email to that effect, and you can fine tune...

Although as with characters, straightforward likeability isn't the same thing as compellingness (compellingability? compellicity?), of course.

I had a couple of emails from (very young, I suspect_ readers who were dreadfully upset by the end of one of the strands of TMOL, because it didn't have (and couldn't possibly have had) a conventionally happy ending, because it would have been All Wrong in a hundred other ways... Once I'd stopped being disconcerted I took that as a compliment, that I'd seeded the happy-ending potential well enough for them to hope for it.

Just dipping my toe in the water.
Have introduced, but not added my two-penny worth to any discussion.
Surely it must be up to the writer to decide on the ending
of a story/character line, if I don't like a particular character or where they are going and acting, zap them.
It's your story and sometimes an unexpected action gets the reader to focus, is that not why we write?

Love the forum interaction, just need to slowly slip in with comments or observations.

Hello Patyogi.

I've been advised to have alternative endings available, which I don't think is unusual.

Yes, the 'ending' is up to the writer, especially when the writer is sure that he or she knows best.

I don't.

But I'll know better once I explore the possibilities.

Cheers

Michael