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Your really annoying ending to a book?!

204 replies

Liltzero · 09/04/2023 15:55

I've just finished reading a book where the plot was a woman investigating the death of her sister, a death which the police thought was suicide, but she thought murder. The ending was maddening! The reader was left not knowing whether our chief character was murdered by the same man who killed her sister or was she rescued in the nick of the time?!

What books have you read with a frustrating or wrong conclusion or non-conclusion?

OP posts:
00100001 · 13/04/2023 23:49

iwantawisteriathisyear · 11/04/2023 09:35

I've just finished Stephen King's The Stand. Brilliant book but it just petered out at the end. Over 30 hours of reading for a "and they all lived happily ever after". It was as if he'd just run out of energy.

Pretty much all his books have crap endings. I refuse to read any more if his.

Mangomingo · 14/04/2023 00:04

Out of my depth by Emily Barr
Literally ended in the middle of a chapter
I bought a second copy as I assumed some pages were missing from mine

Mangomingo · 14/04/2023 00:05

I love SK and have areas a theory that actually he gets so immersed in his worlds that they don’t end for him. He just has to think up an ending so the books can get published.

Justleaveitblankthen · 14/04/2023 00:09

I adored Captain Corelli's Mandolin, but the ending seemed rushed and silly. They changed the ending for the film.

Deadringer · 14/04/2023 00:14

Strange Sally Diamond. I feel cheated by the ending.

LunaNorth · 14/04/2023 10:14

Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks.

It’s a wonderful book until the last fifty pages, which seem to be from a different novel entirely.

LunaNorth · 14/04/2023 10:16

I just realised I posted that twice.

Sorry. I must REALLY hate it 😂

LunaNorth · 14/04/2023 10:18

The Bunker Diary. The most totally depressing, disturbing ending - and it won the Carnegie Medal!

I’m normally all for kids finding their own level with books, but this one stayed with me for weeks after reading it. I’m not sure it should be marketed at kids, let alone win a children’s book award.

Bleak to the point of nihilism.

Hyperion100 · 14/04/2023 10:19

Love Stephen King but agree his endings are not always the best.

Dark Tower...Crimson King. Just wow.

Flyfodder · 14/04/2023 10:21

goingforalovelywalk · 11/04/2023 09:19

Not really on topic but I remember reading a Jodi Picoult book (which I loved) and the movie version ending was totally different. I think they actually missed the point of the book, by changing the movie ending. Hhmmm!

My Sister's Keeper?

Shocking Hollywood ending, yes, it changed everything

Marsyas · 14/04/2023 10:24

The Miniature
I can't remember why but I can remember hating the ending and feeling like it just didn't explain what had been going on.
Any book where it keeps you turning the page with an intriguing mystery and then either doesn't explain what happened/ why it happened (because the author doesn't know) or cops out (the unreliable narrator was lying all along).

Marsyas · 14/04/2023 10:25

Marsyas · 14/04/2023 10:24

The Miniature
I can't remember why but I can remember hating the ending and feeling like it just didn't explain what had been going on.
Any book where it keeps you turning the page with an intriguing mystery and then either doesn't explain what happened/ why it happened (because the author doesn't know) or cops out (the unreliable narrator was lying all along).

Opps, I mean the Miniaturist

SmiteTheeWithThunderbolts · 14/04/2023 10:34

Ian McKewan's Atonement. The ending is very clever but it makes me want to punch someone. I'm probably mostly annoyed with myself for caring so much about fictional characters that I'm aggravated on their behalf by that ending.

And I've never wanted to slap a fictional character as much as I wanted to slap Briony. Grrr.

JaninaDuszejko · 14/04/2023 10:35

Atonement by Ian McEwan. I got annoyed at the ending then annoyed at myself for being annoyed that a fictional character had made up a fictional story about some fictional characters.

Agree about Captain Corelli's Mandolin as well.

Small Pleasures is on my TBR shelf, should I not read the epilogue then?

JaninaDuszejko · 14/04/2023 10:36

@SmiteTheeWithThunderbolts Snap! 😂

SmiteTheeWithThunderbolts · 14/04/2023 10:41

@JaninaDuszejko Ha ha!

Maybe I need to give Ian McEwan credit for his skill in writing about fictional characters so well that we want them to have a happy ending, but feel tricked when they don't. If the book had been poorly written, we wouldn't have cared enough about them.

I'm clutching at straws here - it's still a bastard way to end a book!

CosyCoffee · 14/04/2023 10:47

Yes to Small Pleasures! I enjoyed the rest of it but cannot recommend it because of the ending.

The same goes for Miss Benson's Beetle. Just wrap it up nicely fgs!

MurderAtTheBeautyPageant · 14/04/2023 10:48

Fall on Your Knees by Anne Marie MacDonald. The whole novel is very gloomy Canadian gothic but something happens in the closing pages that just was too depressing and grim. And it became the stand out thing about the book for me. But not in a good way.

SequinsandStilettos · 14/04/2023 11:08

Jodi Picoult Guardian
If you could edit your past, what would you change?
I would not let Nick Cassavetes direct My Sister’s Keeper, the film. He said [the ending] was going to match what was in the book, then changed it.
On her website
Why did you let them change the ending of My Sister’s Keeper the movie?
I didn’t. It’s hard for people to believe, but when Hollywood adapts a movie to the screen, the author is pretty much at the bottom of the totem pole. You sell the rights and it’s like giving a baby up for adoption – you aren’t allowed to call daily and ask what she’s been fed for breakfast. Of course, you hope that the family you’re trusting with your baby is a good one, and that she’ll turn out well in the long run…but there are no guarantees. There was a lot of wonderful stuff in the movie version – most notably the performances, which I really enjoyed and by which I was really moved. There were some scenes added that weren’t in the book which I loved (the beach scene, for example). But the ending IS different. Although the director had indicated that he was going to keep my ending, in the end he did not hold true to his word. And if you think YOU were disappointed, well, you can imagine how I felt. However, the movie was a success for me, because it drove hundreds of thousands of new readers to my book – which hit the bestseller list again. Should you watch the movie? Sure! It’s still sad and sweet and beautifully acted. But that’s the beauty of a novel-to-film adaptation: if the screen version isn’t what you remember, you can always go back and reread it!

teaandtoastwithmarmite · 14/04/2023 11:13

Second life by s j Watson. I can't remember the storyline now but I remember finishing it and being really pissed off for about 3 days 🤣

Cinnamon23 · 14/04/2023 11:14

How to Kill your Family!

It was a good plot twist but HOW can it end there? What happens next?! Hoping for a sequel.

teaandtoastwithmarmite · 14/04/2023 11:14

So1invictus · 11/04/2023 09:53

I read it so you don't have to...

Brighton fucking Mermaid.

It was, tbf, shit all the way through, but when one of the mystery main characters coincidentally turns out to be called Sirene (as in mermaid) I just laughed out loud and wondered how this utter dross ever gets to be published. And the other characters going "isn't that a coincidence that someone we've been calling the mermaid for 300 pages turns out to be ta-da called mermaid!"

NB: this isn't a spoiler alert. It's me having taken one for the team by reading the worst book I've read for a very very long time.

Her books are mainly awful imo

SequinsandStilettos · 14/04/2023 11:16

The ending to Sue Townsend's The Queen and I.
spoiler
it was all a dream, Bobby Ewing eat your heart out

You spend years telling kids not to end their short stories with that. Never understood why Townsend used it. Even worse, she then wrote a sequel Queen Camilla, which ignored that in its entirety along with several inconsistencies between novels.

MurderAtTheBeautyPageant · 14/04/2023 11:16

Cinnamon23 · 14/04/2023 11:14

How to Kill your Family!

It was a good plot twist but HOW can it end there? What happens next?! Hoping for a sequel.

A rip off of Kind Hearts and Coronets I believe. And I saw her publishers touting it as a clever and completely original twist.

Pfffffffft.

MissDollyMix · 14/04/2023 11:17

How are we 2 pages in and no one has mentioned One Day? I literally threw that across the room in disgust! I wanted redemption for the main character but he still remained as awful as ever and the girl…. Whatever her name was… might not have existed at all…