My experience on the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme: Month 8

Hello again! Welcome back to my series of insights into what it’s like to undertake the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme.  

Month eight – two thirds of the way through the 12-month course – and we are talking endings.  

Real life rarely gives nice, neat, ‘everything now makes sense’ endings. I think of moments in my life that, in hindsight were endings: the slice of pie my father saved for tomorrow, believing he had a tomorrow. The last time I carried my son on my hip, or the last time my daughter was happy to hold hands in public.  

Endings are important in stories, and I have a theory as to why: our own mortality, the inevitable ending we all face, is a major reason the artistic endeavour of novels exists. In short, we read novels to practise dying.  

A novel demands we invest in the illusion of a life – a life we go on to learn the rhythm of. We become familiar with its timescales and habits; with the loves, regrets and transformations its characters undergo. And then we’re asked to face the ending of these. We turn the last page and find we have to leave. Novels are rehearsals for mortality – a way to practise the art of letting go. Furthermore, the novel (though I’m happy to include poetry in my thesis) is the only art form that does this. Great paintings, transcendent symphonies? These imply, but a novel enacts. 

A painting or a song is experienced in the immediacy of the present — it’s capable of evoking eternity or the sublime, certainly — but it cannot carry us through a life lived in time. Whereas a novel unfolds like consciousness. It moves us through sequence, choice and consequence, memory and application. It requires duration, mirroring the shape of a human life. It delves into the interiors of others: we become mind-readers when we are novel-readers. When a novel ends, it doesn’t just stop, it dies – and as readers, we feel that loss. How many of us approach the ending of a great story with dread, not wanting to let the characters go? Isn’t part of a great ending, from a skilful author, that bittersweet realisation that you’re never going to hear that character say another thing? You’re never going to experience any more of their possibilities. These endings echo our own.  

In most great novels, the ending doesn’t just provide narrative closure. It asks questions: where and what is the meaning of the story? Has it done enough? What regrets remain, and why? Is there redemption available, or merely resigned comprehension and deflated acceptance? These are life’s big, keep-you-awake-at-three-in-the-morning questions. Music and paintings gesture towards these, but only fiction makes us experience them. 

But there is a paradox, too – as the novel dies, as the people inside it vanish, there are also beginnings. Something of a book’s characters can remain with us. We get to consider what happened and imagine their next steps. Perhaps we will discuss them with friends and, through those conversations, test out our own life narratives and soul yearnings? We may even – those of us writing a series – get to write up what comes next. The metaphysics of the novel intrinsically binds beginnings within endings. 

Which is maybe why, in this month of learning all about how to craft a brilliant ending, I actually find myself turning towards the beginning of my manuscript.  

As I have been writing my way towards the end of my first draft, I’ve been experiencing more and more of a ‘stop’. The words I could conjure were brief; sketchy. Writing began to make me feel a bit burned. I was charred wood, and the story wasn’t getting inside of me anymore. It was because the narrative ending of the story needed more supporting structure at the beginning.  

So – as in life, as in novels, endings have beginnings. By working through my Ultimate Novel Writing Programme course materials and discussing the detail with my tutor and peers, I’m better able to understand the significance of my book’s ending – and see how the structure of the beginning affects it. Heading back to the start of my novel has made the ending feel more alive. I can positively feel it inflating. 

Endings are powerful, and we writers bear a weighty responsibility for them. If you agree with my theory, we’re purveyors of rehearsed mortality – which might be the most human act of all. If you’re anything like me, you might want to get some help and assistance with shouldering that responsibility. For that support, I can highly recommend the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme! 

The Ultimate Novel Writing Programme (and its little sister, the Novel Writing Course) run twice a year. Our most intensive tutored courses, they offer writers more personalised, one-to-one support than is available through any other online writing course. To find out more about either, or to apply to be part of our next cohort, visit the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme or the Novel Writing Course web page. You can also contact us at any time to chat about your writing journey and explore which, if any, of our courses or services could help you. We love to chat with authors, and we will never sell you a service that we don’t think is the best fit for you – so don’t be shy!

Rachel Davidson is a long-term Premium Member of Jericho Writers prior to joining our Writer Support Team, Rachel loves helping hopeful writers, such as herself, to solve their problems and take a step or two closer to achieving their writing dreams. Rachel has previously self-published a trilogy, the first of which achieved bestseller status in fourteen Amazon categories in the UK, US, Australia and Canada and is now seeking her traditional publishing debut with her latest manuscript. You can find out more about Rachel via her Instagram @RachelDavidsonAuthor.