Comments on: How Much Happily-Ever-After Is Just Right?

By: Susan Lyons

Susan Lyons — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 14:42:13 +0000

Kathy, what a great romance! 49 days and now 40 years and counting. When you hit 49 years, you have to have a crazy big celebration.

You’re so right about kids. A couple of weeks ago I got together with a friend who never had kids of his own though always wanted them, and now (through his second wife) has grandkids. He and his wife have been looking after the little ones. He said he was amazed how those kids changed everyone’s lives. I was amazed that it had never dawned on him before that kids have that effect!

By: Kathy Crouch

Kathy Crouch — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 07:40:23 +0000

I don’t need the wedding or engagement ending. It is enough that they are beginning their relationship and developing it their own way. I’m a luck lady that met her soul mate and married him 49 days later. And we are closing in on 40 years this coming Februrary 19. We met on New Year’s Eve on a blind date. We chatted a few days before on the phone but that was it. Then we went out had a blast together and the next day I went to meet his family wow what a family lol. But no I don’t see a couple getting married and everything instantly in modern times. If they both have careers and busy lives they have to make adjustment. You know I read where some fans of Eve and Roarke in the JD Robb In Death series were asking Nora Roberts if they were going to have a baby. Kind of hard with the type of lives they have. A baby changes everything. I personally don’t have any but can sit back and see how it affects lives. You can’t just pick up and hop on a plane to Mexico or Hawaii or somewhere. Heck you can’t even hop in the car and drive to see some friends. It requires more planning less spontaniety in someways to me.

By: Susan Lyons

Susan Lyons — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 04:24:03 +0000

Mary Anne, I’m very much with you. My stories often end with exactly what you said: love plus the promise of a happy ending some time in the future – but with still some issues to resolve. What I hope I’ve shown the reader is that both characters have the guts and motivation to keep working through their issues, individually and together. Because, after all, once you get married, it’s not like a guarantee of smooth sailing. There will still be problems, and as a romance reader, what I want to see in a novel is that this couple has what it takes to keep working through those problems for the rest of their lives.

By: Mary Ann Clarke Scott

Mary Ann Clarke Scott — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 02:13:59 +0000

This is an interesting topic that I have thought about a great deal. Although I’ve always been a reader of romances, until I started writing, I didn’t understand that HEA ending was a requirement of the genre. In a way I resent that. I know there are millions of readers who disagree. But as a writer, I need to let my characters work out their own path. I think that’s why I write women’s fiction. I don’t want to follow someone else’s rules with my creation. I do like when a hero and heroine find love, but that can be an incremental thing. I often think of love, or even a more committed relationship by the end of a book, as being a kind of prize for doing all the hard work involved in the characters’ arcs. I think, in today’s world, it’s far more believable if there is simply love plus the promise of a happy ending at some indeterminate time in the future. Anything could happen, and I trust the reader to imagine the HEA that they would like to see. But it’s not that simple. And most people, of any generation, don’t decide to get married after a week or even a month, no matter what challenges they’ve overcome. In the ms. I’ve just completed, my young protagonist finally chooses the love of a man who she misjudged through most of the story. But she has some issues with the secrets he kept, and who he really turned out to be, that aren’t that simple to resolve. She also has the higher priority goal of reconciling with her family before she moves on with her life. She’s only 22, so for me this makes sense. It doesn’t preclude a HEA at some point later on, maybe even with the same guy. Who knows? There might even be a sequel someday.

By: Susan Lyons

Susan Lyons — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 01:48:38 +0000

Linda, I think the thing that bothered me most about the ending of Gone With the Wind is that Scarlett finally learned her lesson. She stopped yearning after her opposite – the languid Ashley – and realized her passion lay with the man who was, even if she might not have wanted to admit it, just like her: strong, energetic, raw around the edges. She went through her character arc and she deserved her reward! And how could Rhett, who’d been so loyal to her in his own way, finally give up on her? Yeah, I’d probably have written a different ending. Fabulous characters and story, though.

By: Susan Lyons

Susan Lyons — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 01:46:13 +0000

Judy, it’s interesting what you say about your daughter. I caught a snippet of something on the radio today, where they said that 20-somethings are very, very into getting married. And that would make me think they’d be looking for wedding bells in their romance novels. But there are exceptions to everything! Each reader is truly unique.

I think you’re right about mysteries with romance – you can definitely keep more interest in the relationship if you don’t have it go too far too fast.

By: Linda Warren

Linda Warren — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 22:22:37 +0000

Susan,
I can remember how disappointed I was when I read Gone With The Wind. What! After war, death and misery they still don”t get together. “Frankly, Scarlett, I don’t give a damn” (not sure that’s the exact wording) just didn’t do it for me. Gotta have the happy ending.

After all these years, I remember those characters though. The writer made me feel their love and the chemistry they had when they were on the page, but… they couldn’t live together. Both were too stong willed. Oh well.

Linda

By: Judy Hudson

Judy Hudson — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 20:12:26 +0000

“Happy” endings are so subjective it is hard to get it just right for everyone. I think Susan is right that it becomes part of your “voice”. My 29 year old daughter tells me she is disappointed when my stories end with a wedding. I think she (still?) falls into the Chick Lit genre fan catagorie. I agree that whatever makes the characters happy males the most satisfying ending, and those of us that write with the barest of outlines often let the characters decide.
One of my proof readers, on reading the first book of a mystery/romance series I am working on, said it was “refreshing” that the couple did not make it to bed in the first book. I thought I detected a slight sigh in her voice though. Hopefully that will bring her back to the second and third books to watch the relationship progress. Like TV shows like Castle or (fill in your favourite here) where the sexual tension is really what keeps you coming back week after week, I think giving it all away in the first book would be a mistake. It’s all about the tension.
Judy Hudson