Should we avoid sad endings in Novels???

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EMaree

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In short: nope.

Give us a bit more to go on though, willsonjohn90 -- do you think we should avoid sad endings? Do you enjoy them? Do you write them yourself? Does the genre affect whether or not you expect a hapy ending?
 

Magnificent Bastard

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Please don't avoid sad endings in novels.

I don't read novels for a happy ending - I read them for a satisfying ending, the one that fits the story and logically follows for it. Is it happy? Cool. Is it sad? Cool.

The most important thing is that the ending leaves an impact, and doesn't feel forced. I want the tone, atmosphere and plot to gently lead me towards whatever ending, but not so much so for it to be predictable. I want to read the ending and be a bit wowed, and then realise how much it really fit the novel and see that was the best possible way to end it. Joe Abercrombie's First Law comes to me as an example of an interesting ending here.
 

Bufty

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Another no. Why would you want to stop all sad endings in novels? It would be impossible to enforce anyway.

Next stop - movies? Ghost - Titanic - ET - ...
 

STING

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Hamlet would be a bit odd with a HEA.

I have a feeling that if Shakespeare were to submit a query letter and a one-page synopsis to agents, they might have recommended a HEA ending to Hamlet.

I don't read novels for a happy ending - I read them for a satisfying ending, the one that fits the story and logically follows for it. Is it happy? Cool. Is it sad? Cool.

That's what, I think, all readers look for. Satisfying and logical are the key words. That logic, in my opinion, should be introduced subtly from the second half or the last one-third of the book in a manner that has a subliminal influence on the reader and yet doesn't give away the ending.
 

oceansoul

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I love sad endings. I actually wish there were more tragic romances about!
 

laazy

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My favorite, most memorable endings are all pretty sad, or at the very least bittersweet.
 

sohalt

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Write a sad ending. Poetic justice is a lie. Sometimes bad things happen to good people. Sometimes the wicked go unpunished. Sometimes love is not enough. Always, fortune is blind. To forget that would be lazy and dangerous. It makes the fortunate self-righteous and the unfortunate self-loathing. Write a sad ending, because people sometimes need the reminder; because it's one truth, and truth has a value of its own. We need stories to give us hope, but we need stories to give us truth as well, because hope without truth is a mockery and if there's no truth at all, we cannot relate.

Write a happy ending. It's true that sometimes the wicked will thrive. It's not true that _only_ the wicked will thrive. You _can_take the high road and win. Violence and lies are not your only options. It's in the nature of power to be a temptation, but if you're too weak to resist it, that's on you. Those you keep from power might not be just as bad as you once they get hold of it. To forget that would be lazy and dangerous too. It makes the ruthless complacent and the meek despondent. It blinds us to the full range of our potential. It traps us in the status quo and creates an illusion of inevitability, so awfully convenient to those who'd rather view themselves as having no choice than muster the courage to make the more difficult one.

Write an open ending. Closure is overrated. There's only one ending in real life, and only if you make the story about yourself. Happy or sad? Who could tell? There might be no higher instance to decide the meaning of it, to weigh your heart, to sum up your ledger. All there is are choices and their consequences, sacrifices, trade-offs, opportunity costs. Was it worth it? Let your readers decide. Some people like a bit of room for their own thoughts. You are an artist, not an accountant. You don't have to fix the meaning of things. You couldn't if you tried.
 

Ravioli

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HELL NO! I'm all for big emotions. A kiss at the end is not big emotions. It's "Bleh not that again" to me. It's slobbering and exchanging bacteria. Millions. If the main character's love interest walking away from him, or the MC offing himself or getting offed, makes sense for what has happened so far, then by all means, crush the reader with that.

Case in point: it's not because my MC has found a new love, that he hasn't been breeding and hoarding demons up until then. A million demons versus one girl, if we wanna keep it real, the girl won't miraculously heal his broken heart or make the town forget why they sicced a lynch mob on him. The damage's been done. Walking off into the sunset with her and leaving all his demons behind, including having killed his best friend and messed up his little sister, that would ruin the entire book retroactively. So she watches him jump to his death, the end :hooray:

Seriously, if a sad ending makes more sense than a backlit smooch fest, make it sad. Many readers enjoy being crushed. It's why people watch Grey's Anatomy or Doctor Who. They want the adventurous, lovely, cheesy build-up and grow emotionally attached to the characters, and then they want to cry like a toothing baby and tell the internet that they've just been heartbroken. Let'em have it.
 

Katharine Tree

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Novels should have satisfying endings, as others have said. Characters should have learned, grown, and changed. Big questions about the outcome should have been answered, or be fairly certain. Themes should have been developed.

In short, the reader should see why he or she just spent umpteen hours reading the novel. Senseless tragedy, just like unearned joy, is ultimately unsatisfying.
 

Sage

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I love sad endings. And bittersweet endings. And happy endings. As long as they fit the novel.

A question I don't see here, though, is what genre? Some genres or markets do demand a happy ending or at the very least a hopeful ending.
 

Marian Perera

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A question I don't see here, though, is what genre? Some genres or markets do demand a happy ending or at the very least a hopeful ending.

Exactly. If it ends in tragedy, it's not a genre romance, no matter how beautifully written the story, or how much more meaningful the pain and sorrow are.

Personally, I'm fine with any kind of ending as long as that works for the story and the genre.
 

quicklime

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Hey Everyone!!! I would like to discuss should we avoid sad endings in Novels?

to what end? I guess maybe more context would be helpful here--the question on its surface seems almost self-obvious (wait, sure...shall we burn every tragedy already in print as well, from Greek and older tales, through the Bible itself, Shakespeare, and modern stories??) so I feel as though you're asking either a narrower question than you originally posed and/or one with a very specific angle.

can you help us out? Because not every story can or should end happily, so you'd essentially be advocating not telling a LOT of stories at all. That would seem a tragedy in itself, if we were to cull classics like Hamlet and more modern works like House of Sand and Fog and I am Legend simply because their ending wasn't worthy of an Enzyte Bob smile....
 

Marianne Kirby

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Personally, I don't like sad endings. However, that's just a matter of personal taste, and I wouldn't want to deprive others of them.

I concur. I just need there to be some kind of sad warning on them so I don't get invested and then spend the next week depressed because the dog died, so to speak.

A question I don't see here, though, is what genre? Some genres or markets do demand a happy ending or at the very least a hopeful ending.

But would someone trying to write for one of those markets want to put a sad ending on their story anyway? That, to me, would indicated either a lack of familiarity with the market or a desire to purposefully step outside of the restriction to see what happens.
 

Marian Perera

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But would someone trying to write for one of those markets want to put a sad ending on their story anyway?

There are periodic threads in the romance forum asking why there can't be romances where one person dies in the end.

It always comes down to this : readers who pay for a romance but are given a tragedy will be royally pissed, and it's rarely a good idea to make readers feel deliberately cheated.
 

ishtar'sgate

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According to Donald Maass, the majority of readers prefer a happy ending. I'm one of them. I get enough 'reality' in my regular life.
 

Marianne Kirby

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There are periodic threads in the romance forum asking why there can't be romances where one person dies in the end.

It always comes down to this : readers who pay for a romance but are given a tragedy will be royally pissed, and it's rarely a good idea to make readers feel deliberately cheated.

Well, of course -- but that's why I said that would indicate either a lack of familiarity with the market or a desire to purposefully step outside of the restriction.

I eat those Harlequin Blaze novels like candy. I've considered writing them because I've read so many hundreds of them. I know the formula and the tropes -- and I know that deviating from those things would change what I was trying to do enough that I might not be writing a Harlequin Blaze anymore because I'm aware of the market.

I guess my point is that OF COURSE you can write any sort of ending you want -- anyone can -- in any genre. But if you're a fan of the genres where it isn't done for a reason, you probably already know the consequences.

Does that make sense?

(I really really don't like sad endings myself.)
 

sohalt

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Of course, if you go by marketability, conventional wisdom is that a happy ending will be the easier sell. But even in purely commercial fiction, sad endings can sell like hotcakes, see Nicholas Sparks.
 

sohalt

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Which is why people keep asking OP to specify the genre they had in mind, which they didn't. My point, I guess is, that you don't necessarily have to limit yourself to marketing labels that require happy endings.
 
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