Where does it end???

[ShelbyDawn57]

Sort of a follow on to Where to Begin...

To be honest, all of our stories are just snippets of larger stories. We just choose the slice we want to write.
Everything we write could go on theoretically forever, but we choose where to end it when a specific goal has been met with the characters involved. I get comments all the time asking for more, another chapter, closure for some ancillary theme. The characters are all still there, I've just chosen to stop the story at 'this' point for, well, reasons...

My query is, how do you decide where your stories end?

There are not right or wrong answers. I just thought this would be an interesting discussion of our craft.

 

[SamanthaBehgs]

I'm going to go with a practical answer here: It ends when I've run out of additional installments of the story to write that I think have the merit to stand on their own. For a single story, I generally have an end in mind, some storyline I wanted to resolve and once it was resolved, that's kinda where it stops. Take this with a bucket of salt, though, since I've only ever written a single erotic story (it's not done with the editing phase yet), but I have written stories of other varieties and engaged in other types of writing and all have that same basic stopping point. When I've made the point I set out to make, I (generally) am done.


But also I have a question to go along with yours: Isn't one of the perks of chain stories that you can have a world full of stories that never end? If you're done writing but you keep getting asked for more, isn't the chain story feature a way to pass the torch, thus having your cake and eating it too?

 

[Jorunn]

Most of my stories have a happy ending. After the main section and sex, I bring the two main characters together for happily ever after. But don’t go into details on that. Then I get comments wanting to know more.

 

[CalBishForNow]

I've got one series, not officially "completed" but I haven't touched it in months. The 11th and final chapter of it is the one in which the FMC resolves some things (mostly about herself but also about some of the interpersonal relationships) that had been bugging her since chapter 7 if not earlier. I have several more ideas in the series or with those characters that I didn't get around to and still might someday, but they'd either be simple romps with a lot of fucking and not much plot, or introduce some new problems/conflicts and end when they're resolved.

I've got another series in progress. Like the first, I have a definite plan for an end that resolves the main character's internal struggle. In this one the main character is male, but his wife is getting more emphasis than the MMC of the first series did. And like the first, I have a number of ideas for the series/characters that I might not get around to before resolving that struggle.

Those are my series. Most of the episodes (I'm calling them "parts" in the Title field just because it takes up fewer characters) end with a sex scene that's satisfying for the characters and intended to be it for the readers. Sometimes I feel bad about having such a one-track mind, but I find a climax is often a good climax.

 

[Erozetta]

When the story stops wanting to be told, I stop telling it. (Or when I get to a point where adding anything feels forced.)

 

[gunhilltrain]

Sort of a follow on to Where to Begin...

To be honest, all of our stories are just snippets of larger stories. We just choose the slice we want to write.
Everything we write could go on theoretically forever, but we choose where to end it when a specific goal has been met with the characters involved. I get comments all the time asking for more, another chapter, closure for some ancillary theme. The characters are all still there, I've just chosen to stop the story at 'this' point for, well, reasons...

My query is, how do you decide where your stories end?

There are not right or wrong answers. I just thought this would be an interesting discussion of our craft.

As in where to begin - sometimes, if you have characters you like, it's worth revisiting them again. It could be weeks, months, or even years after you wrote them. You can go forward in their lives or backwards to an earlier time. I've found that to be very helpful, and I've been doing more of it. Not every character or situation will work that way, but some do. I went back to a set of stories from four years ago, and I only moved the plot forward about a month in that situation (it's still a work-in-progress).

 

[SkyBubble]

I usually wind up with a brief (or relatively brief) "epilogue/denouement," a sentence or two that kind of puts a bow on the story. For example, my story Dorothy Surrenders ends with the sentence "The next thing I remember is the sun poking through the bedroom window."

 

[SkyBubble]

As in where to begin - sometimes, if you have characters you like, it's worth revisiting them again. It could be weeks, months, or even years after you wrote them. You can go forward in their lives or backwards to an earlier time. I've found that to be very helpful, and I've been doing more of it. Not every character or situation will work that way, but some do. I went back to a set of stories from four years ago, and I only moved the plot forward about a month in that situation (it's still a work-in-progress).

I've done that, and you're right, sometimes it's a few years later when I get another idea about them.

 

[StillStunned]

In academia, the conclusion is defined as "the point where I got tired of thinking".

In fiction, the story ends when the arc is completed. A satisfying conclusion - or at least some point of conclusion - where there's a natural break in the events of the characters' lives. The afterglow of a sexual encounter. The moment when a random hook-up turns into something serious. When the adventurers have robbed the tomb and gone their separate ways. The voyeur's lust object turns off the light. The romantic weekend away is over and the adulterers go back to their partners.

If there's another story to tell, even with the same characters, it's a new story.

 

[Areala-chan]

When the conflict serving as the obstacle to the resolution has either been overcome or proven insurmountable is when the story concludes for me.

 

[OddLove]

I don't have a lot of experience writing. Other than two stand alone stories, my other 9 are all part of an ongoing story that I just add to whenever I wanna write. Although, few more stand alone ones in the making.

Whether it's a new 'episode' or 'spin-off' or a whole new stand alone story, I usually just end it with them going to sleep. If the last scene doesn't happen in the evening, then I kinda summarize the rest of the day and explain how they spent their evening in order to end it at night.

I don't think it's a strict rule, but I find it satisfying to ending it with a 'then they spooned, the end'

 

[alohadave]

My query is, how do you decide where your stories end?

When the interesting parts of the story are finished.

More pragmatically, I write to the ending I've picked out before I started.

 

[SmilingLez]

I think it depends on whether you write for yourself or write for your reader(s). Either way, it's a "power exchange" - you give your reader(s) what they want or you control what you give to your reader(s).

 

[THBGato]

When the conflict serving as the obstacle to the resolution has either been overcome or proven insurmountable is when the story concludes for me.

This.

However, I'm aware readers often want a little more closure. I know I do. Hence why nearly all of my stories connect: the main characters in one crop up as side characters in another (or even ones by other authors), so readers can see what happened to them years later.

 

[lovecraft68]

Being this is erotica I feel the story ends after the two characters-whoever they may be-get together, or some other climactic type sex scene that resolves the story.

 

[AwkwardMD]

For me, the ending is usually the first thing I have.

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

I've told this story before. I had everybody die natural deaths over a number of years. The End, right? Nope, somehow I managed to carry part of it into the afterlife.

 

[TheRedChamber]

I just wrote a long post on another thread, so I'll go with the short and confrontational answer...

If you don't know when your story ends then you haven't grasped what the point of it is.

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

I just wrote a long post on another thread, so I'll go with the short and confrontational answer...

If you don't know when your story ends then you haven't grasped what the point of it is.

And your answer shows you didn't grasp the true nature of the question(or I didn't ask it clearly enough). I know exactly where all my stories end or I wouldn't have published them. My readers frequently don't agree, and let me know that there needs to be more for this reason or that. My question is how do you, the author make that determination? How do you decide? Given an infinite number of possibilities, what is it about that point that makes you choose it, and what things do you consider when making the choice?

For example, a story I just put in my pending folder is called 'The Girl in the Mirror.' It's about the MCs relationship with that reflection. I stopped the story, for now, when the utility of the MC looking in the mirror ends. There are lots of unresolved threads in the story, lot's of things could pull in, but I decided the story was the MCs relationship with 'The Girl in the Mirror,' not the rest of her life. My beta reader disagrees. Discussions will ensue. She can be convincing.

My point is, I made the choice I made for reasons. I had hoped we as writers might explore those choices instead of passing around one liners.

POS, @TheRedChamber, i don't mean to single you out. It's just your response came through when I knew exactly what I wanted to say. Thanks for replying and I hope you expand your answer.

 

[AwkwardMD]

I was not trying to deliver a one liner. I'm just like that. I know the ending intimately before I ever start writing. Knowing the ending is what differentiates a cute idea that never gets on the page from something I'll actually finish.

Everyone else would make their own creative decisions. Nobody else can make yours. That's what makes it so important for you to make them.

 

[Cagivagurl]

Sort of a follow on to Where to Begin...

To be honest, all of our stories are just snippets of larger stories. We just choose the slice we want to write.
Everything we write could go on theoretically forever, but we choose where to end it when a specific goal has been met with the characters involved. I get comments all the time asking for more, another chapter, closure for some ancillary theme. The characters are all still there, I've just chosen to stop the story at 'this' point for, well, reasons...

My query is, how do you decide where your stories end?

There are not right or wrong answers. I just thought this would be an interesting discussion of our craft.

For me the story ends, when I'm sick of it...
You are right, we choose a segment of a characters life, because it's interesting...
When it becomes a struggle to find an interesting continuation. It's done... Next please...

Cagivagurl

 

[alohadave]

Knowing the ending is what differentiates a cute idea that never gets on the page from something I'll actually finish.

Absolutely. I always know which stories I'll struggle with when I start writing them before knowing the ending.

 

[Statius]

When the particular point has been made, or the aspect of the/a character(s) I am exploring has come full circle.

 

[TheRedChamber]

And your answer shows you didn't grasp the true nature of the question(or I didn't ask it clearly enough). I know exactly where all my stories end or I wouldn't have published them. My readers frequently don't agree, and let me know that there needs to be more for this reason or that. My question is how do you, the author make that determination? How do you decide? Given an infinite number of possibilities, what is it about that point that makes you choose it, and what things do you consider when making the choice?

For example, a story I just put in my pending folder is called 'The Girl in the Mirror.' It's about the MCs relationship with that reflection. I stopped the story, for now, when the utility of the MC looking in the mirror ends. There are lots of unresolved threads in the story, lot's of things could pull in, but I decided the story was the MCs relationship with 'The Girl in the Mirror,' not the rest of her life. My beta reader disagrees. Discussions will ensue. She can be convincing.

My point is, I made the choice I made for reasons. I had hoped we as writers might explore those choices instead of passing around one liners.

POS, @TheRedChamber, i don't mean to single you out. It's just your response came through when I knew exactly what I wanted to say. Thanks for replying and I hope you expand your answer.

As for how I decide where a story ends...I'm a strong plotter and tend to like nice neat structures to fall into place sooner rather than later in the planning process.

Most story concepts kind of have natural start and finish bounds built into them. If you are writing about a relationship hitting a rocky patch in the run up to a wedding, then the wedding day seems like a natural assumed ending place, even if you are not sure yet whether one or neither of the characters show up to the church or if the reception hall ends up on fire. You could extend those bounds to them arriving back from the honeymoon if you like. If you really want to you can really stretch things out to have a grey haired golden anniversary epilogue - pushing it, but you're still framing it around the wedding so you might get away with it.

Similarly, I've had an idea half kicking around my head for a while, but only had the idea of setting the events on election night, a special kind of night where the 'political beats' can provide background and structure for the 'story/erotic events' In this case the story is bound by the polls opening at the very earliest and by the dawn and admission of defeat at the latest.

In some case natural bounds can become a problem. In one draft I have, a character is given two weeks to live - which doesnt sound like a lot but its actually hard to write a whole fourteen days worth of stuff happening to her.

 

[DeMont]

Sort of a follow on to Where to Begin...

To be honest, all of our stories are just snippets of larger stories. We just choose the slice we want to write.
Everything we write could go on theoretically forever, but we choose where to end it when a specific goal has been met with the characters involved. I get comments all the time asking for more, another chapter, closure for some ancillary theme. The characters are all still there, I've just chosen to stop the story at 'this' point for, well, reasons...

My query is, how do you decide where your stories end?

There are not right or wrong answers. I just thought this would be an interesting discussion of our craft.

@ShelbyDawn57,
Good morning my dear colleague,
I end my stories when the story has told itself. Strange answer you may think but to me, as I've mentioned elsewhere, a story will tell itself, in its own time, in its own way and for its own reasons. I perceive writers to be the "tools" of writing. The ideas, the settings, the actions, activities and conclusions flow from us but the biggest question in my mind is where do they come from?

Some people say the brain of the writer, some say the imagination, most call it "their Muse". All I know is when it's got hold of me I write frenetically, literally disgorge the words that I'm usually generating faster than I can type and when all the words are out I go back and "clean up this mess", as my dear mother would say.

For example, I have just completed a story that I set as a personal writing challenge for myself inspired by a colleague here that asked a question in a thread. In meantime I have a four, five or six part "stroker" underway that is being inspired by people I used to know in the real world and that one is coming from pure speculation and imagination. It won't come in chapters, it's going to be a "mega-stroker" if you will.

Different tales from entirely different sources but both subject to the whims and will of my "Muse".
Respectfully, always,
D.