Expectations, Endings, and Strange Romps

In which I confess displeasing some readers and then talk to another author, Lincoln Michel, on his own genre “take”

My 2024 suspense novel, The Deepest Lake, has fared well in terms of sales and critical reviews, but one thing I’ve noticed, thanks to an unhealthy tendency to visit Goodreads, is how many readers quibble with the ending. This is a dangerous thing to admit! If I were only here to market myself, I’d tell you that all readers loved my ending. Alas, I am not that conniving or self-disciplined.

(In my defense, readers of Lisa Jewell’s Don’t Let Him In, one of my favorite beach-perfect suspense novels this year, also quibbled with her ending, but that’s a future post.)

One author friend emailed me to say she loved the characters in my most recent book—“more complex than your average thriller”— and the chance to spend time in the head of a young writer. But, she admitted, in a final statement tenderly enclosed within gentle parentheses, there was something she’d hoped for that didn’t happen in the final chapters.

When I asked her to tell me more, Christine (who gave me permission to share her words) wrote, “I don’t consider myself a person who reads much commercial fiction, but I do think that the thriller genre—or its hybrids—tends to provoke more of a thirst for justice baked into the whole conceit, and how we are conditioned to read it.”

Another writer friend, Sky, wondered if our current times were to blame. In an age when so many bad guys go unpunished, some readers crave the catharsis of immediate justice. I hear you, Sky!

Writing The Deepest Lake, I had a dramatic question in mind, and my novel answered that question. A mystery was solved, twists were twisted, lingering queries were answered, and the denouement (etymology: French to “untie”) unknotted the knots as all denouements should.

(That sentence was for Caitlin, who cracked up when I audio-messaged her recently about this topic using a bad French accent. Denouement denouement denouement.)

Did readers of my book achieve full catharsis? Evidently, some did not! They have written to me with their own clever and fiendish ideas for alternate endings, ranging from subtle to brutal. Our country is in a very weird place right now. And also: where were these helpful folks when I was drafting? I love some of these ideas!

I have more to say, but first, I want to keep hearing from other writers about endings.

A month ago, Deborah Williams provided her take, including mention of at least one novel whose spiral-shaped ending (characters returning to the place where they started, but with some change) satisfied her.

Finding the Ending: Not a How-To

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Today in Part II, we hear from Lincoln Michel, author of Metallic Realms, a hilarious, heartfelt, perceptive, and formally inventive novel about a group of sci-fi obsessives. The prose is so funny and original that my husband and I couldn’t stop reading parts aloud to each other. Lincoln Michel’s debut novel, The Body Scout, also earned raves.

Lincoln is well known for his Substack, Counter Craft, in which he talks about craft, interviews authors about their processes, and demystifies publishing better than any other Substacker on my must-read list. Thanks for this interview, Lincoln!

Andromeda:

As someone who writes compellingly about genre, do you think each genre brings with it a specific expectation for how the story wraps up? Any examples come to mind?

Lincoln:

I like to think of genres as a shared conversation between authors, readers, and critics—I wrote about that a bit here fwiw—and with that come expectations, in-references, areas of focus, and so on. This can be either constricting or generative for a writer. I find it generative myself, since expectations can always be subverted and tropes reimagined. I’d probably say the work that interests me the most is the work that has at least some level of subversion or surprise.

In terms of endings specifically, I think expectations vary a lot by genre. Modern Romance readers tend to expect a happily-ever-after ending. Mystery/crime readers expect the case to be solved. Other genres might not have much ending expectations per se—though they might have more expectations about other elements like worldbuilding or character—unless you get to the fine-grain subgenre level. I don’t think there is any kind of specific “science fiction ending,” but I suppose I’d expect a more upbeat ending to a solarpunk SF book and a more downer ending to a cyberpunk SF book.

There are few things harder than endings. The conventional advice is that the best ending “feels surprising but inevitable.” That the reader can’t easily see it coming, yet also that the reader will think “Oh yeah, that makes sense. I should have seen that coming.” It’s very hard to be both surprising and obvious! I’m not sure I have any great advice on achieving that balance. It’s writing, revision, feedback, revision again. Rinse and repeat until it feels right.

Andromeda:

Do you have anything you want to share about reviewer or reader responses to your own novel endings?

Lincoln:

I’ve been very happy with how many readers have told me they loved the ending of Metallic Realms, my most recent book. A lot of readers said the ending surprised them but also had emotional heft. So, the ending seems to have worked the way I was hoping.

I can say that I was actually afraid the ending was too obvious, too telegraphed. But apparently it was only too obvious to me. I ended up adding more foreshadowing to the book even. Which is just to say it is very useful to have readers you trust give you feedback on drafts.

Andromeda:

To what extent do you feel like you should be writing toward expectations or trying to stretch the reader’s “horizon” or “envelope” of expectations? Is the notion of expected endings helpful to you, limiting, or both?

Lincoln:

It all depends on what you want to do and the kind of novel you are writing. There is great pleasure in more traditionally plotted and written books and great pleasure (at least for me) in more experimental, postmodern, surreal, what-have-you books. I like weird novels and experimental structures, but I also want all my books to be really fun to read. I want my readers to be enjoying themselves while things get weird. A strange romp is perhaps the goal?

One way I try to make that work is by meeting the reader expectations on some levels and surprising them on others. My first novel, The Body Scout, is a science fiction thriller. It has a fairly straight-forward mystery/thriller plot with a detective-like narrator finding clues and trying to solve a crime. There’s twists to the ending, but twists are expected in a mystery book too.

OTOH, I think it gets pretty weird in the worldbuilding and the dystopian future it envisions. Being more straight-forward in the plot allowed me to be stranger in other aspects. This could work in the reverse too. If your book is more conventional in character and structure, you might be freer to get weird with the plot. For me, this is one method to keep writing feeling free without leaving the reader behind.

Thank you, Lincoln.

We’ve started the conversation, but it’s far from over.

PT Readers: How do you feel about endings? What do you expect from different genres? Have you been pleased or disappointed by the endings of any recent novels? Do you think today’s political, social, or environmental situation make people yearn for more justice, closure, or simplicity?