On Endings

     Endings. They are important.
     Now that I have blown your mind with that little piece of unheard wisdom, allow me to explain. When a someone experiences your work-be it a book, a movie, a play, a game, anything really- they are making an investment. They are investing the time they could have spent building a house, or saving a kitten, or making dinner, or even just reading another book. They invest in the characters, loving the heroes and hating the villains. They invest in the world that you have built for them. And at the end of that work, they are going to want a return on their investment.
     This comes in many way. That warm fuzzy feeling you get when the guy (or girl) gets the girl (or guy) after fighter for him/her the whole story. That ah! moment when you realize the killer wasn't the butler, but instead it was Colonel Mustard in the Pantry with the Hair Dryer. When the hero, just when all hope is lost, learns the True Meaning of Friendship and is able to stop the evil Wizard from destroying... whatever it is that wizards destroy.
     The reason that this pay off is so important is that your reader has been following your protagonist for who knows how long. The reader has watched him get rejected, or looked with her for clues, or one of a million other possible things. Your reader has, in essence, almost become the main character and they want some gratification before they leave them. A parting gift you could say. Give them something to thank them to coming to your party (the party in this case being your book, or movie or what-have-you), and they'll be more likely to come back over when you invite them again.
How you deliver this gift of investment is entirely up you and your genre. A few clues that seem unimportant, but once the killer is revealed, make it obvious who it was. The growth and maturation of the hero as he goes from Small Town Peasant to Hero of The World. What ever it is the important thing is that you have it there, somewhere. If you don't you can leave your readers feeling cheated or used. Which brings me to an example..... (Warning contains spoilers)
     There was a book I read, it's also a movie now, called, "My Sister's Keeper." Now, don't get me wrong, MSK was a great story about family and the cost of personal freedom and a whole slew of things, and I greatly enjoyed reading it. If I didn't like it, I wouldn't hate it as much as I do now.
     The reason I hate is because it made me care about the characters and their plight. I'm not going to summarize the story, but suffice to say that Anna was suing her parents for medical emancipation, and when she finally one her freedom I wanted to know what Anna was going to do with her new power. Was she going to give her kidney to her dying sister, or would instead hold on to it, and no longer be used as an organ farm. It was the central question to the story. She left the court room to go the hospital, and I turned the page...
     To see that she died in a car crash. (End Spoilers)
     And that's when I started hating the book. I spent all that time worrying about Anna, laughing with her, crying with her. In other words I put a huge investment in Anna and what did I get out of it? Nothing. I felt that I had been robbed of my ending. Robbed of my resolution. Robbed of my investment. If the story had been bad to begin with I would not have cared. My investment would have been small, and it would not have mattered if I did not get anything back. But the fact was, it was a good book, but the ending made it a horrible one.
     The point of that long tangent is simple. Reader's expect a return on investment. If you write a bad story, it won't matter too much if the ending doesn't have a big pay off.They won't care about your story anyway. But if you write a good one-or even an OK one-you better make sure that your ending is perfect. It is the last thing that your readers see of your story. You want to make them feel like they finished with more than when they started. I'm not saying you need to have explosions and fireworks at the end of the story, just a little sign saying "Thank You For Reading"

-Me