Happily Ever After
Well, I just got off the phone with one of my editors and she said I did a "risky" thing with one of my new books (out later in the year . . . don't want to give away the title and spoil it), in that I didn't give the relationship a happily ever after. By a long shot. And she said she felt readers would be very invested in the couple. And I thought about it . . . .
And I realize my version of Happily Ever After (hereafter abbreviated HEA) is different from perhaps traditional ideas of what that entails. Whereas before in women's fiction and romance there was a riding off into the sunset, a wedding . . . something along those lines, I don't always do that. Sometimes I do. But very often there's a little twist. Like the wedding isn't to the person you THOUGHT the wedding was going to be. Or someone dies, but there is a tremendous beauty to their death, a bond that continues with the living after their death.
I wonder if some of this is my spiritual beliefs. Buddhists believe life is suffering. It is unavoidable. Logotherapists believe, in a nutshell, that human grace and dignity in the face of suffering is perhaps life's highest aspiration. So maybe I believe an ending that isn't quite ride off into the sunset, but does contain grace and dignity in the face of suffering is STILL an HEA. I don't know. I want readers to have a satisfying emotional conclusion.
Maybe THAT'S my real HEA.
And I realize my version of Happily Ever After (hereafter abbreviated HEA) is different from perhaps traditional ideas of what that entails. Whereas before in women's fiction and romance there was a riding off into the sunset, a wedding . . . something along those lines, I don't always do that. Sometimes I do. But very often there's a little twist. Like the wedding isn't to the person you THOUGHT the wedding was going to be. Or someone dies, but there is a tremendous beauty to their death, a bond that continues with the living after their death.
I wonder if some of this is my spiritual beliefs. Buddhists believe life is suffering. It is unavoidable. Logotherapists believe, in a nutshell, that human grace and dignity in the face of suffering is perhaps life's highest aspiration. So maybe I believe an ending that isn't quite ride off into the sunset, but does contain grace and dignity in the face of suffering is STILL an HEA. I don't know. I want readers to have a satisfying emotional conclusion.
Maybe THAT'S my real HEA.
posted by Erica Orloff at 12:02 PM
2 Comments:
I struggle with that same concept in writing romance and women's fiction. The reality of romance especially, is so different than the image we create in our books. I feel a responsibility not to perpetuate the myths that get women in trouble (i.e. the alpha male who in the beginning of the story is an abusive a-hole but is redeemed through the love of a good woman by the end ... I just hate seeing that story in today's books).
But I think chick lit readers are more accepting of the un-Disney ending. If anything, they want to see the heroine prevail on an internal level. The story that comes to mind is Clean Slate by Laura Caldwell. The heroine doesn't end with a sexy new dude, or even a posh promotion in her career. The ending is like the beginning of her new life.
Hi Mary:
I agree. I would chafe under a traditional HEA--as a woman. I don't want to ride off into the sunset with alpha male. I like my beta nurturer just fine.
I think I more squarely, at heart, write fiction, but it's tough in a genre-centered field. I know my next MIRA, called Invisible Girl isn't romantic suspense, it's SORT of suspense, it's SORT of Quentin Tarantino-esque in its story-telling devices. In short, it's hard to describe. My editor said it most reminded her of The Magus (remember that book?), so she went online and found out what genre they called that book. The answer? Fiction.
ARGH!
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