Loved this from Literary Agent Lucienne Diver’s (The Knight Agency) recent FB post: You know when you hit that point in writing your novel where you just want to say, “And then more stuff happens, the end”?
Surging into the climax, the Supreme Ordeal, is not the time to feel that way. LOL. Rather, the energy you’ve built up while writing the bridge to this point should have your adrenaline surging like a mad rush over Niagara Falls. Because that’s what the climax of a novel is—plunging your reader over a thousand-mile-high waterfall.
It doesn’t matter in what genre you’re writing, whether Fantasy or Horror, Romance or Literary, Mainstream or Christian. This is the crux of your novel, where everything comes together, although not in a tied-up sort of way—that’s for the next section, denouement and resolution. But where all of the action and discovery, all of the angst and trials and tribulations and self-realization and, well, everything, merges into one big giant fat boom.
That doesn’t necessarily mean the boom is actually a bomb going off, though such may happen. It can be running the final race, attacking the enemy, surging over the falls in a hand-made boat, staring that bottle of bourbon smack in the eye and pouring it out. It’s the culmination of everything you’ve led your reader up to for seventy-plus-thousand words. It’s the raison d’etre for why said reader has followed your folks all this time.
And, as with all things fiction, it’s both internal and external. The outer blowing-up-of-things mirroring the inner fight. But this does not mean analysis. By now, your reader knows well the Achilles’ Heel of your Protagonist, what the villain is after, and what happens if said Protagonist doesn’t save the day. What we don’t need here is any sort of pausing in the action to wax philosophical about how we got to this point, what it all means in the cosmic scheme of things, and the hero’s place in it. Remember, when the tiger is racing to pounce, we don’t stop and think of the history of tigers, or what sort of gun we’re shooting him with. Rather, we shoulder the gun, aim, and shoot. If successful, we have time for all that analysis later. No, right now what we need is for things to blow smooth up.
Even in Literary fiction, we can have a literal blow up. In my latest novel, I Just Came Here to Dance, we meet with a fiery climax. Who knew. Conversely, even in an action-oriented Mystery, such as Kevin Don Porter’s Missing, the climax can rather be scary-cold, that feeling in silence of oh-my-god, we’re all gonna die!
The main thing is this climax must fit the book you’re writing. All that painstaking time of carefully crafting your characters, plot, plot points, etc.; having the fortitude to push though that point of “and then more stuff happens, the end;” setting your hero up with his most supreme ordeal—the thing that requires all that he’s learned so far—requires a huge emotional happening.
And one where the reader says in the end, Wow.
As an award-winning author and editor, since 1993, 50 + of my authors’ books have sold to Traditional publishers. Many have won awards, been made into films, been featured in Publishers Weekly, and become bestsellers. I also love English Labradors, red wine, and write literary fiction and co-authored nonfiction,
Excellent advice. One of my pet peeves is an unsatisfying ending. If a reader puts in time reading a book, the writer owes them the courtesy of wrapping up the lose ends and bringing it to a conclusion.
Exactly, Holly! And doesn’t it make you crazy when they don’t!
I agree with all you say here. Because I tend to vicariously live the fiction with my protagonist(s), I feel what they feel, experience what they feel, and that allows me to give the reader what is, effectively, a first hand experience. Anything less is surely short-changing your reader. Of course, writing with such intensity can be exhausting, emotionally, but it usually results in an ending that’s satisfying to all concerned.
Great context, Stuart! I would bet that your work is wonderful, as you write from the visceral heart. Feel free to shamelessly promote it here! LOL. Post a link and I’ll go take a look.
All Best,
Susan
Some years ago, my family and I were traveling through the Rockies. As we rounded a bend in the road at one point, both sides of the road had what appeared to be remnants of a lava flow from long ago, almost as if someone had poured thickened liquid down the sides of the mountains which were quickly hardened. Smooth undulations spread through these “flows”. It was something I had never seen before nor since. Nor have I ever forgotten the feelings of awe at their existence. It certainly had that climaxing “wow” factor that you talk about in your article. That is how I want my readers to feel when they finish a story I have written. Not an easy task, but possible. Thanks for your input.
What a great analogy, Patricia! And yep, not easy. But no one ever said this would be 🙂 I would bet you accomplish the task!
All Best,
Susan
Spot on description of what a good literary climax is; also, a very realistic description of how writers feel as they near that point in their books. For all parties involved, the climax needs to be emotionally satisfying. Follow these tips, and yours will be!
The climax being emotionally satisfying is the key, Valorie!
Thank You,
Susan
Excellent advice, Susan. As an author and speaker, and newly retired chairman of a national writers’ association, I can’t tell you how often I’ve come across newbie writers whose plots either fizzle out, or who seem to find it necessary to enter into lengthy explanations of why and how. As authors, we need to allow our characters to have lives of their own, so that they become so well known to our readers that their ultimate actions – though unexpected – are obvious with hindsight. I’ve just reworked the climax in the penultimate chapter of my novel Time to Shine (first in a series of psychological mysteries) and am about to edit (not for the first time) the denouement. Let’s hope it has the Wow factor you’ve indicated.
Perfectly said, Mel! And great point about the characters ultimate actions being unexpected, but obvious in hindsight. I’m always talking about no matter what they twist, the character must “fit” together in the end.
And I’d be willing to be your novel has that Wow factor! Wishing you the very best with it!
Susan