Crazy Kiwi
As with so many things, it all depends on the execution of it.
You could handle it in a way that completely wows people or you could drop the ball and make it feel cheap.
The idea is to strive for the former.
Impudent Upstart
Yeah, there's potential either way. I would also suggest not relying solely on the power of surprise. It should work given feel of the rest of the story. Is it still worth reading even if I know going in the world has a big red 'X' on it? Surprises tend to work once, and sometimes not even that many times.
edited 22nd Sep '13 9:52:58 AM by LittleBillyHaggardy
Nobody wants to be a pawn in the game of life. What they don't realize is the game of life is Minesweeper.
You could put an twist on it. In an idea that I have given up on, the heroes travels between the different timelines, 'preventing' the bad ones. In the end they accidentaly 'prevent' their original. At that point they(and hopefully the reader) realizes that time didn't work the way they thought and that they have destroyed about a dozen different universes
Hey all,
This was an idea I dabbled with in the very early stages of outlining my novel (back when I wanted it to be a trilogy). It involved the total destruction of the MC's world. As the idea involved time travel, it meant the MC was left unscathed, but everyone else was lost, and the event was recorded in history.
The concept was written off. The whole novel caved in and I scrapped the idea, but I'd like to use this kind of ending in a novel at some point. I feel it has a shock element, an inevitability that the reader cannot see because of the "happily ever afters" that are so common.
What are your opinions on such an ending? Is it powerful and unexpected, or a cheap way out?