whether in your own writing or when you're reading something, what do you prefer?
if we're not talking about books with deliberate cliffhangers, i like endings that are somewhere in the middle between happy and sad. i like there to be hope at the end of a book, but what about y'all?
I think it's a happy ending as long as most of the main characters make it out alive. Everything else in the story could burn, but as long as most of the main characters survive, I'm good.
For some of my stories it’ll be a happy ending, but in one I think it’ll be bittersweet.
I like to go with bittersweet as well.
As in: pretty much everyone is dead, but the oppressive government fell
Or: Things have finally returned to normal, but about a million people died
Maybe: The main character has PTSD and schizophrenia, and will probably go on to ruin every relationship they've ever had, but they're not dead
And so on and so forth. Endings that end in a way that leave the reader to decide whether the cost was worth it.
Yeah, bittersweet/sad endings are the best. I think happy endings are often too convenient, especially if the book was action-packed and the costs were high, while overly sad endings just feel hopeless. A bittersweet ending has a good combination of sad and happy feels, which often makes you feel more sad but not without a glimmer of hope. Typically when I write I write bittersweet endings.
