The End

I would say that the hardest part of writing is the ending. A good story can go on for a long time. When you get s used to writing what happens next, it's hard to figure out when to stop writing. Since good stories also take place in whole worlds that have existed before and will exist after the story takes place, it's difficult to pinpoint where the flow of time stops mattering.

How you want to handle your ending depends on what kind of story you're writing. In general, we think that an ending needs to tie up every loose end. When you do this, you know you're at the end because there is nothing else that can be said. All conflict has been resolved. I generally attribute these endings to stories for children. No questions need to be asked. Any questions that are asked can be answered.

Tying up the loose ends isn't a bad thing. If you want to make a completely self-contained story that has no ambiguities, there is no better way to do it. However, there are limitations to that technique. It's hard to make a sequel when your story has resolved all of the problems there were. It also doesn't leave much to the imagination. Nobody has to wonder what's going to happen next because you can basically answer it with "and they lived happily ever after." This isn't a requirement for a story, but it is a factor that draws the audience in and keeps them there. It makes them want more, which is pretty useful for a writer.

The second section is largely the opposite of what the first section was. When you leave some loose ends, it gives the feeling of a continuing universe and gives your readers things to wonder about while you write your next installment. That's not the whole picture, though. Writing is about capturing reality, and in reality, it is quite rare that loose ends are tied up. You could have a question that remains unanswered for 60 years. A story that ends before the world ends shows us that each thing we go through is more of an episode than a complete series.

And ultimately, the ending of the story is the ending of an episode. Ask yourself, what is the actual story here? In Watchmen, which has a great deal of stories and information, the real story (or the main story) is that somebody is killing masks and we need to find out who it is and why. When that story ended, the book ended. Everything else that was going on was supportive of the main story; it explained the history of the world and the characters, which gave relevance to the main story.

It doesn't matter whether your story leaves loose ends or ties them all up, they both end when the episode ends. The Bernstain Bears is a series of episodes. Each episode ends nice and cleanly. Watchmen doesn't. However, in both stories, you are sure that it is over.

Imagine a story about a pregnant teenager. She is scared about her situation and is overwhelmed. She has her friend drive her to the drug store. While there, she goes to the baby aisle. Standing among 8 different brands of diapers and not having a single clue how to even begin understanding what she was looking it, she wonders if she even wants to keep the child.

Now, at this point, we generally think that the story is whether or not this girl keeps her baby. While it certainly could be, it doesn't have to be. This is where, as an author, you have to ask yourself what your story really is. If your story is about whether this girl chooses life for her child or life for herself, then you can go the standard route of does she or doesn't she. But maybe you want to choose the road less travelled. Maybe this story is about a girl who realizes that she has to grow up. She's been doing adult things which led to adult consequences and require adult decisions. Here, it doesn't matter what path she chooses. She realizes that she has to act like a grown-up. Once that realization happens, the story is over and it should end shortly after that, even if there are a ton of loose ends.

I've mentioned in the past the idea that a story can just be a bunch of crazy stuff that happened. I can still take either side on it, but I do have one more thing to say: if your story doesn't have a plot, it will be very difficult to know when to end it.