Category: Plot

Troubleshoot an Ending You Hate

Troubleshoot an ending you hate

After you’ve spent weeks, months, or years writing a story, you want to like what you’ve written. What if you hate your ending? First, you need a thorough understanding of the three parts of the an ending. You may hate your ending because you don’t understand the function of each part. If that’s not the problem, ask yourself the questions below so you can troubleshoot an ending you hate.

Do you love the beginning and middle of your story?

Review the beginning and the middle. If anything isn’t working in either of these sections, it may be reflected in your ending. Fixing a problem that far back in the story can be a lot of work, but it is more than worth it.

Do you hate the climax?

Maybe the climax isn’t really all that … climactic. If you start your story with your main character finding out her mother isn’t her mother, then the climax must be more intense. If your climax isn’t the most intense or exciting part of the story, you need to rethink it. Or you may need to tone down other high points in the story to make the climax more thrilling or intense.

Maybe the climax bores you. It seems much too typical of your genre. Review what readers expectations are in your genre. How can you give your ending a fresh twist while still giving readers what they want?

Do you hate the wrap up?

The wrap up, or denouement, is when all the loose ends not addressed in the climax are tied up. Have you left a few loose ends dangling, allowing them to trip up readers? Review your story to see what loose ends need addressed.

Is it taking too long to wrap things? As a mystery writer I often have a ton of loose ends to tie up. So I’ve learned not to leave the explanation for all of them during the wrap up. In A Storm of Doubts, I spread the explanations over the climax and wrap up, where it makes sense to insert them during the course of the narrative.

Have you not really wrapped up the story at all? The climax happens, the hero grins, and the story simply quits. Most readers like some time to say farewell to the characters. Give them some kind of closure.

Do you hate the final lines?

I think final lines are the most difficult part of a story to write. When I reach the last chapter, and especially the last few paragraphs of the last chapter, I often feel like I’m composing music. I want depth to my final lines, but I also don’t want to linger so long that readers are rolling their eyes and flipping to see how many pages are left. It’s a balancing act, like balancing the brass against the woodwinds and keeping the percussion from drowning everyone out.

A good guideline in the final lines is to echo a theme of the story. In “A Rose from the Ashes”, the first Rae Riley mystery, the final lines echo a Bible verse from the Christmas story. Since it’s a Christmas mystery, that’s appropriate. It’s also funny, which echoes the upbeat ending. Rae is concerned with being accepted by her new family in A Shadow on the Snow, and the final lines echo that. Rae has doubts about her father’s love in A Storm of Doubts, and you guessed it, that’s what I echo.

Writers, how do you troubleshoot an ending you hate?

For more advice on writing endings, click here.

1

Use Characters to Write a Satisfying and Surprising Ending

Use Characters to Write a Satisfying and Surprising Ending

I’m a character writer. I start with characters and let their personalities suggest plots. If you come to the end of your story and don’t like it, use characters to write a satisfying and surprising ending for your readers. How? By revisiting your characters to see if there’s some quality in their background that will change your ending from dull or typical to memorable and remarkable.

A Shadow on the Snow

When I reached the end of my first novel, I knew I wanted an action-filled climax. I was writing a teen cozy mystery, so I could add more action than you might typically find in a cozy mystery. The first ending had my heroine, Rae Riley, fight the bad guy. Ho-hum. That’s been done before. The second time Rae had help come from an unlikely source during the fight. A bit better, but it didn’t sit well with me. The action seemed mean. I didn’t like it, and it seemed wrong for the story.

So I reviewed what Rae Riley was like and who the bad guy was. Rae is moved to help people out of compassion–she can imagine herself in their situation and knows she’d like help if this bad experience happened to her. Rae also knew the background story of the bad guy. So using those aspects of both characters, I was able to write an ending that, I hope, satisfies and surprises. Satisfies because the bad guy is revealed and the mystery is solved. Surprises because the ending is atypical.

The Great Man (1957)

Another example of a satisfying and surprising ending comes in the movie The Great Man. I’ll tell you the ending because most people have never heard of it and it’s extremely hard to find a copy of it. But if you like character studies and actors who have parts they can really bring to life, search for it.

The beloved radio and TV host Herb Fuller dies in a car crash. His network wants to wring as much publicity out of his death as they can. Herb’s manager Sid persuades another radio host on the network, Joe Harris, to tell the top brass that he was a close friend of Herb’s and wants to put together a radio tribute to great man. The top brass approve the project, including the network head Phillip Carleton, who runs the network with a quiet voice and an iron fist.

So Joe dusts off his reporter skills, interviewing the people who worked with Herb. And discovers what an utterly despicable guy he was, completely at odds with his public image. Joe grows more and more conflicted. Sid says if his live show goes over well, the network will give Joe Herb’s shows. If Joe doesn’t create the tribute, Sid will run a show that is a highlight reel from Herb’s old shows.

Joe also learns from Carleton that the network won’t hire him for Herb’s shows unless he breaks his contract with Sid. Carleton does not want to work with Sid, who is a bully. He thinks he can get Joe out of the contract by letting people think the network isn’t interested in Joe. Carleton explains the charade he’s put in place and the build up he’ll give Joe if he gets out of the contract. Joe comments that it’s cold-blooded. Carleton disagrees, saying it’s a business that sells time for products and those are promoted by on-air personalities.

On the night of the live broadcast, Joe decides at the last minute to roll the show that reveals who Herb Fuller really was. This won’t surprise many viewers–the hero of the story doing the right thing. This ending is satisfying because Herb is so repugnant that viewers are glad he’s going to get his comeuppance, even if it is posthumously.

The surprise comes in Carleton’s office. Sid hears on the radio what Joe is doing and rushes to the phone to have them cut Joe off and run the back up show. Carleton stops him. He says Joe has just made himself a household name across the country. Sid’s only power came from covering up for Herb’s horrible behavior. Now that the world knows, he’s go no hold over the network. The network can use Joe’s integrity to sell products just as easily as Herb’s avuncular act. Both are good for business.

This ending surprises because we are used to stories in which characters in power react angrily at being thwarted. But Carleton’s view of how to run the network is established earlier. The network is just a business to him. And he’ll use whatever necessary to stay in business.

What stories or movies have satisfying and surprising endings?

For more tips on how to write endings, click here.

0

Why Are Endings Hard to Write?

Why are endings hard to write?

It might seem odd to have endings as my theme in September instead of December. But if you’re like me, most of your usual habits get sidetracked in the preparations for Christmas. And I think mastering how to end a story is crucial to good writing. When you pick up any book on writing, there’s usually a ton of advice on how to begin a story. Because if you can’t hook readers at the beginning, they will never make it to the end. But endings are just as important as beginnings, but I think they are more difficult to pull off successfully. Why are endings hard to write?

The beginning and middle determine the ending

The ending pulls together all the elements that have come before. So if one of those aren’t working, then the ending will reflect that. With a bad beginning, you only have to go back a few chapters to figure out what’s wrong. If the ending isn’t pulling together, you have much more story to excavate through.

Writers run out of inspiration

The ending is usually the last thing you write for a story. By the time you’ve fought through the beginning and middle, you may feel like you have nothing left to say and just want the whole thing to be over with like a bad cold. With no inspiration to fuel your writing, the ending can come across as rushed or incomplete.

Endings have to surprise and make sense

Accomplishing those two objectives in an ending is what makes it so much harder than a beginning. There are limitless ways to begin a story–with action, a provocative remark, and stirring appeal to the senses–and you have the whole story to build out from that hook.

With an ending, you have to work with what came before in a way that readers will see as logical. But to make the ending a surprise, you have to reveal that logic in an unexpected way. When you can use logic and the unexpected effectively in an ending, you will provide readers with deep satisfaction and the kind of ending they remember with fondness.

So we’ll be exploring endings with all the challenges and rewards. Writers, are endings are hard for you to write? Readers, what are some memorable endings?

For more posts on writing endings, click here.

2

Add a Set Piece to Your Novel

Add a set piece to your novel

The beginning of your story is intriguing, sure to hook anyone who picks up it. But now that you’ve reached the middle, it’s just lying there, limp and lifeless. What do you do with a saggy middle? Add a set piece to your novel.

What’s a Set Piece?

I’ve heard this term in connection with movies, specifically the thrillers by Alfred Hitchcock, so I looked it up. According to Wikipedia, the term originated when a movie needed the production team to build a new set instead of reusing sets leftover from other movies at the studio. To make such an expense worthwhile, the filmmaker made the setting part of an important scene. Now the term means a critical or jaw-dropping scene or sequence within a movie.

The rescue of Princess Leia and the escape from the trash compactor is a set piece in the middle of Star Wars: A New Hope. Foreign Correspondent by Alfred Hitchcock has several set pieces: an assassination on the steps of a large building during a rainstorm, the hero sneaking through a windmill in Holland as he eavesdrops on Nazi spies, and a murder attempt at the top of Winchester Cathedral in London.

So How Do I Use a Set Piece in a Novel?

Use a set piece when you want your story to take a dramatic or unexpected turn that will affect the rest of the story. You can use more than one, depending upon the genre and kind of story you are telling.

In my teen cozy mystery, A Shadow on the Snow, I have set piece smack in the middle of my novel because the plot takes a dramatic turn from that point on. Like in the old days of the movies when the director built scenes around an expensive set, I want my readers to have the time to appreciate what’s happening in the set piece, so I slow the narrative down. The set-up, actual set piece, and wrap up play over three chapters. The set piece itself has a shadowy figure chase my main character, amateur sleuth Rae Riley, through her small hometown in a snowstorm on the night of Valentine’s Day. This chase leads to a pivotal scene with her newly found father. In that scene, I let the dialogue take over, which also slows the story down.

Two Warnings

I said to slow your story, not stop it. Your story is a glider. If you slow it too much, it will crash.

My other warning is that any set piece can’t be more exciting than your climax. If your set piece in the middle of your novel has the heroine save London from certain destruction, she’d better be saving the world from that same fate at the end. In the climax of Foreign Correspondent, the heroes’s plane is shot out of the sky. They are forced to make a crash landing and then cling to the wreckage while they wait for rescue. If you find your set piece is overshadowing your climax, you either need to tone down the set piece or amp up your climax.

I’d love to hear from you. In your writing, had you ever had to add a set piece to your novel? Readers, what’s a memorable set piece?

For more tips on writing the middle of novels, click here.

0

How to Patchwork the Middle of a Novel

How to patchwork the middle of your novel

I’m reposting Bettie Boswell’s article on how to patchwork the middle of a novel because she offers such good advice. I’ve used this technique in the past and almost employed it while working on my current mystery because I got stuck in a scene and spent way too much time mulling over a single plot point. I was just about to skip ahead to another scene when I had a breakthrough. But I’m keeping this tool in my writer’s toolbox.

One method that recently worked well for me is to patch that muddled manuscript middle together like a quilt. This was a strategy I used when writing my novel, Free to Love. 

Warning:

You need to kind of know where you’re going before you start working on your patchwork blocks. When I reached the point where I struggled to keep things moving, I sometimes skipped ahead to an idea that I thought would eventually be a scene in my story. 

I would jump into that scene and fill in the conversations, stitching them together with setting, tags, the five senses, conflict or tension, an arc, and any other good writing tactics needed to complete the scene. The work went faster because I had skipped the hurdle holding me back. With less effort, because I felt free to move on, I soon had a nice block of story for my quilt. I jumped around and created several blocks. Before long, I was even able to go back and take on the scene making the hurdle that held me back in the first place.

When I exhausted my creation of blocks, I then figured out the placement of each scene and what might be a good binding strip to attach each blocked scene to another. At this point I printed out what I had written in small print, with two pages on one piece of paper (a function on most printers.) I cut scenes out and put the blocks in an order that made sense for the story. Some of the blocks had changed my story but they still met the goals and themes I set at the beginning. 

After I figured out the order that each block would fall in my quilted story, it was time to put the patchwork together. I did that by binding each block into the story by using transitions, adjusting wording to make things fit, figuring out where to leave the reader hanging between chapters and scenes, and sometimes throwing a scene back into the rag bin for another quilted story.

This type of organization worked for me. It might not work for anyone else but you never know until you try. I am not as good at quilting as my grandmother but her beautiful bed coverings provided inspiration for this type of writing. If nothing else works, snuggle under or relax on top of your favorite quilt and brainstorm what might happen next in your story. Happy writing!

For more of Bettie’s posts, click here.

*****

Hidden names

BUY AT AMAZON

Amber’s father, Max, betrayed her and her mom when she was sixteen. Determined to make it on her own she refused all contact with the man and paid her way through college by making jewelry. Now, she finds it hard to let any man get close to her heart.

Months ago, he asked her to make some jewelry. She reluctantly agreed, needing the money he offered to set up her new venture, a studio for artists. Then he died, leaving a jeweled trail of trouble connected to a ring of cybercriminals. 

Against her will, Amber must team up with Federal Agent Graham to gather up clues and stay one step ahead of people who don’t care who they hurt to protect their secrets. 

The wounds of Graham’s past complicate their cross-country race as he becomes attracted to Amber. As they uncover the secrets her father left behind, they must learn to trust each other, before time runs out to defeat their nameless enemies, and find long-delayed healing.

*****

Author Bettie Boswell

Bettie Boswell always loved to read and create stories for family and friends. In 2016 she began writing and illustrating stories to share with the world. She is now an author/illustrator of both children and Christian adult fiction and non-fiction books. Her efforts include contributions to educational works, leveled readers, magazine articles, and devotional and short story anthologies. Bettie has two grown sons, one daughter-in-law, three grandchildren, and a busy minister husband.  Follow Bettie on her website, Bettie Boswell Author/Illustrator.

0

Powered by WordPress.com.

Up ↑