When do you Know the Story is Complete? Randy Kraft
When do you know the story is complete?
Randy Kraft
I was asked recently a question from an aspiring writer: how do you know when the book ends? The mutual friend serving as messenger was also curious because she is often disappointed by endings that seem rushed or implausible. Or writers who drop another layer or story line into the mix late in the game, as if an afterthought. Do they do that to give the reader something to ponder or talk about in book group? I was asked.
Why do so many novels seem to end unsatisfactorily or not actually end at all? Even the best fiction will be disappointing if the ending comes too soon, or too late, or doesn’t make sense.
I was reminded of folklore about the novelist Tom Wolfe, who apparently could never quite stop writing/editing, to the point that his publisher would send a courier to physically remove the manuscript from his hands. He wrote big stories in big books with very definite endings, which may have been enhanced by a good editor.
Oddly, the very next day, another friend, a fabulous photographer, told me he was asked by a writer he knows how he decides when a photographic series is complete. The questioner has been working on a novel for many years and cannot find his ending. My friend felt visual art was different, so he asked me.
I’m also reminded of a quote from one of my all-time favorites, W. Somerset Maugham: There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.
The question of an ending comes up often for creatives of all types, so, contrary to Mr. Maugham’s wisdom, I feel compelled to answer, as best I can, and my answer is simple: the ending is when the story is complete.
The photographer too tells a story in a series of images and when the story is told, he’s done. The photographs tell the tale. I imagine a painter does the same – the image is complete when whatever is meant to be conveyed is perceptible. One can always add a brush of paint, another photo or more pages, but at some point, the story is told.
Some writers outline their work, so they write to a preconceived conclusion. Makes it much easier, I suppose. Some have the story complete in their minds before they write [Ann Patchett is famous for this] so they know at once when they get to the end. As for me, I write character-driven fiction, so I may not be exactly sure where my characters are going. I follow their lead, and when they get to the right place, I know. I have an ah ha moment. What writer Julian Barnes called the sense of an ending. I may spend more time making sure the wording is right, but the end has come.
JK Rowling said she had all seven Harry Potter books lined up in her mind before she wrote them – she knew where each one would conclude, and how the storyline would continue, and ultimately end. A literary storyboard. Few of us have that clarity.
Here’s the thing: most fiction is about conflict or journey or both. It would be easy to say the conflict is resolved or the journey ends, but the truth is, conflict does not always resolve and often the journey continues. Many novelists say they write to find meaning as well – to sort out the confusion in our midst. Even without absolute closure, there should be evolution, or revolution. A shift in perception perhaps. A solution to a problem. A sense of inevitability. The end.
For the writers who find themselves in a never-ending cycle of writing, I suspect their story is not well-defined. And let’s be clear, no matter the currently fashionable post post-modern style of storytelling – stream of consciousness, rambling expository narratives, autobiography dressed up as fiction, or stories told in many voices – fiction is all about storytelling. Stories start somewhere and they end somewhere, even if you feel characters’ lives go on, they can go on in the reader’s imagination.
There are many ways to tell a story. The Booker Prize winner, The Promise, by Damon Galgut, is an excellent example of linearity at its best, as is the brilliant Matrix, by Lauren Groff, a life story from youth to death. Sometimes we start toward the end, the story unfolding from the past, as in the Booker nominee, A Passage North, by Anuk Arudpragasam, a journey where past and present converge, until what needs to be learned has been revealed. End of story.
You might have the start of a trilogy, like Crossroads, by Jonathan Franzen, or it’s just a very long story, like The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois, by Honoree Fanonne Jeffers, but there is an organic end point. When you get there, have the good sense to stop. Rejoice – your story is on the page. Edit and wordsmith and proofread, of course, but stick with the story arc. If you cannot stop writing, go back to the beginning and read through the eyes of the reader. Answer the question: what is the story you’re trying to tell? If you know that, you’ll know when, and how, the story ends.
Keep in mind: all good things come to an end
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After a career in journalism and communications, Randy Kraft writes fiction, pens book reviews for a culture/entertainment website, and blogs here and there on reading and writing. She holds a Masters in writing and occasionally coaches.
Rational Women, a collection of stories, was published in 2020.
In 2016, the novel Signs of Life was published, and in 2014, Colors of the Wheel. Raised in New York City, she resides in Southern California.
RATIONAL WOMEN
At the heart of these eleven stories is one question: are women the rational beings we mean to be?
Some are ruled by reason, while others allow passion to suppress good sense. In the search for balance, they find their best selves. Or not.
MEET THE RATIONAL WOMEN
On a business trip to Lucerne, a widow follows a stranger into the old town… A chemistry professor’s marriage implodes when his wife compounds her discontent… A white novelist writing about racism confronts the disdain of a black critic… A teacher takes her elementary students’ futures into her own hands … An empty-nester confronts an unexpected obstacle to fulfilling her dream… A late-life PhD candidate discovers her ex-husband still has a hold on her heart… A businesswoman questions her values when she learns her dead mother was never buried… A newspaper editor comes face-to-face with her biases when she misses the heart of a story… A once aspiring sculptor struggles to mold her newborn… At court to argue a minor trespass, a model citizen considers her crimes… In Paris to satisfy her mother’s last wish, a docile office manager’s future takes an unexpected turn.
In a voice reminiscent of Meg Wolitzer, Barbara Kingsolver or Margaret Drabble, stories swing between time and place and personal season, reflecting on what it means to make better choices in the new millennium.
BUY THE BOOK HERE
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