Meredith Mansfield, Author

The stereotype is of the writer sitting in front of a typewriter–or computer, now–with Chapter One at the top of the page and no idea what to put next.   I usually have a pretty good idea of where the story starts before I sit down.  Of course, sometimes that beginning changes in the later drafts, but it doesn’t usually move very far on the timeline. 

Actually, for me at least, endings seem to be harder than beginnings.  Of course, I also know how the story ends before I start.  Not as precisely, though.  There’s that bit of denoument in a novel, after the main conflict is resolved.  A chapter or so that shows the characters settling into their new equilibrium.  I’m often surprised by what they decide to do with their freedom once the battle is over.

One problem I know I have is that sometimes at the end I’m just not quite hard enough on my characters.  I’ve been (hopefully) torturing them physically and/or emotionally for 100,000 words or so and I start to feel like they deserve a break.  Right at the time when it should be at its worst.  See, by the time I’ve spent a novel or two with my characters, I tend to like them and I want them to be happy.   I’ve done that in early drafts of a couple of novels and then had to fix it in the second or third draft.  Of course, as long as it gets fixed, it just becomes one of those things that I need to know I’m going to have to look for in those drafts and no harm done.

The problem has come up, differently and for different reasons, in a couple of short stories, too.  The complaint I’ve gotten there is that the protagonist isn’t doing enough to resolve the problem of the story on his or her own.  In one of those short stories, “Mage Storm” (the short story that sparked my latest novel), I think the criticism is fair.  After all, it turned out that there was a lot more to the story.   I did change the ending of the short story to make the main character more responsible for what happens to him, though.  It’s more of a choice, now.   

In my latest short story, well, that one’s more a journey than centered around an event.  The central conflict is self-discovery.  Yes, another character holds some key information that unlocks that knowledge, but it’s still the protagonist who has to learn and accept it.  I’ll have to go back and try to make that more clear.

Thing is, if you don’t have a satisfying ending, you don’t really have a story.