How many have started a story only to be left with no idea how to bring it to an end?  Or, you have an ending but it’s just… there.  You know in your heart it’s not as strong as everything that’s led up to it. 

This isn’t a lack of creativity.  It’s writer’s block.  And I would wager that you actually do have a terrific ending in mind, or at least the hint of one, and it’s just stuck.  It’s your left brain and right brain having a smack-down.  It’s your creative state being stymied by your analytical state, your judgmental state.  Ironically, that’s exactly what can be turned to your advantage.

The key to unlocking what may already be in your head is to reintroduce yourself to the story you set out to tell in the first place. Engage your analytical state in dialogue with your creative state, not against.  Story rises from what your characters want and need.  Ask yourself: What do you want?  And: What do you want to say?

1. Back to basics

Strip away all the stuff they tried to indoctrinate you with in creative writing class, all of it, and the core of what remains is this: Character + Setting + Problem.   The story’s ending reveals whether the Character successfully resolved the problem or not.

If a story is about your character’s resolution of a problem, the ending can only go one of two ways.  They succeed, or they fail.  That’s it.  Everything else is a consequence of those two states.  It’s the Schrodinger Conundrum of Writing and Story Resolution.   Until the box is opened, until the final observation is made, both are simultaneously true–and that is the core of your block, because they can’t both be true.

Again, ask yourself: What do you want?  Not the character.  You.

Think in terms of a Logic Tree.  If this, then that.  Use your personal motivators to inform what comes next.  If you choose for your Character to succeed, for example, what does that look like?

• Is it a “happily ever after” ending, or has success come at a cost?
• If a cost must be paid, is the cost personal or collateral?
• If personal, is the cost inflicted upon the self, a friend or colleague, a loved one, a treasured possession, a principle?

In other words, what is the Character willing to sacrifice in order to achieve their goal? The single most important quality of the Hero is one of sacrifice.  All fear stems from the fear of loss.  When we ask ourselves, “What does the character fear the most?” we’re really asking, “What are they most afraid to lose?” 

This is the perfect opportunity to go back and strengthen characterization, foreshadow, layer in the clues, so that the turning point feels inevitable.  It reinforces the narrative as being character driven, not incident drive.  Plot drives the story, but characters drive the plot.

Now, the above is just one possible path.  Choose “Happily Ever After” and you’re done.  “Collateral” opens up a whole new line of inquiry [destroy the village], but it has to come back to the Character. 

2. How does this propel you into the end of your story?

In a three-act story structure (Beginning, Middle, End), the third act breaks down as:

• Climax, resolution, denouement.  Or…
• Leap of faith, defeat of the shadow, return with the elixir

The turning point (climax, leap of faith) is the ultimate expression of who the Character really is, which informs everything that happens next.  The arc and ending are organic.  Nothing feels arbitrary or out of nowhere.

The goal is to conclude with an impactful resolution–not only for your character, but the reader as well. Elevate the end into something more than “the end.” Offer your readers an ending that transcends fiction and reveals something genuine about our time, something genuine about ourselves.  #1 in Wells Rules for Writers: be honest. 

Give your readers something to think about.  It doesn’t matter where or when your story takes place.  Your readers live in the here and now.  Speak to them now, offer them something that resonates now.  Something from your own life or the world you live in.

Give them something honest.