Konrath, J.A. - DRACULAS (A Novel of Terror)

In DEEP AS THE MARROW I had a character named Poppy who I had to kill because her arc demanded it. I got tons of angry mail. But you know what? People remember that book because Poppy died. If I’d found a way to let her live, it might have been, Meh.

Look, I can take out the fusing with Alice scene and leave it a little ambiguous, leave a little hope. If we do a sequel, and we want to bring him back, we can find a way.

Paul

• • •

I vote for leaving it ambiguous.

Joe

• • •

I vote strongly against making it ambiguous. If Clay is on the roof when the hospital explodes, he’s dead. We’ve gotta play fair. Suggesting that we might offer some sort of implausible explanation in the sequel for how he survived isn’t going to placate readers.

I also vote to get rid of the epilogue, which makes the book feel like we’re trying to set up two different sequels.

Jeff

• • •

Clay isn’t on the roof. He’s down a few floors.

Here’s the thing, guys. We’re releasing this as an ebook, and before it goes live 200 people are going to review it.

I love nihilistic endings. I thought the end to The Mist was one of the greatest endings in modern horror films.

Word of mouth killed The Mist in its first week, and it tanked at the box office.

Do we want to have a big ebook launch with an average two and a half star rating?

This isn’t like a paperback, where the majority of customers won’t see the reviews. Every potential customer will see the reviews and the star rating on the same Amazon page they download the ebook. Bad reviews will kill sales.

Am I saying compromise artistic integrity and pander to the audience? No.

Am I saying allow a character that readers have grown fond of a chance to survive? Yes.

We’re not making some sort of social commentary or statement with this ebook. It’s just supposed to be gory fun. But it loses some of the fun factor if we annihilate 90% of the cast.

Lanz, dead.

Benny, dead.

Randall, dead.

Oasis, dead.

Jenny, dead.

Adam, dead,

Stacie, dead.

Clay, dead.

Then secondary characters like Winslow, Brittany, Grammy Ann, and Herrick, all dead.

Mort and Shanna are the only POV characters that survive, and one is the main villain.

This isn’t nearly are serious as my other horror novels, but more of the heroes survive in those.

I think we should at least allow for the possibility that Clay lives. This is a classic case of Pascal’s Wager. We have a lot to lose, but everything to gain. What does it hurt to give Clay an ambiguous fate?

And with that, I rest my case. But let the record show that the readers—angry at the ending—will read through our emails and see that Paul and Jeff were the ones who pushed for Clay’s death.

Joe

• • •

“What does it hurt to give Clay an ambiguous fate?”

Ask Brian Keene how much hate mail he got over the ending of THE RISING!

I’m not necessarily voting in favor of Clay dying…if there’s a believable way he can survive the hospital blowing up, I’m all for it. I’m voting against the idea of leaving it up in the air. I’d feel much more cheated as a reader not knowing for sure what happened to him than having him die in the explosion.

Jeff

• • •

Then in the last scene, I vote for Clay crawling out of the rubble.

We need a scene where readers can cheer. Instead we bring in a government conspiracy completely out of left field that isn’t explained or resolved, several depressing deaths, and an open-ended “villain wins” finale.

The more I think about it, the more I think the last fifteen pages kill the fun we had build up for the previous 250 pages.

Maybe it’s my insecurity showing, but now I’m thinking we eliminate Driscoll and her team, and have Shanna find Clay still alive.

I’ve got a wild idea that I’m going to throw out there, for you guys to consider. You know how Hollywood has test screenings? What if I did a happy ending for Clay and Shanna, we gave both endings to the reviewers, and let them pick their favorite? Then we use that one for the book, make the other one an alternate ending, and I don’t have a nervous breakdown.

I like the outcome where I don’t have a nervous breakdown. I’ve written SEVEN novels this year. I’m so close to burning out that I need to mainline caffeine.

Before you tell me no, I think we all need to read the book straight through, and do our final edits. We mention Aliens and so many other cool action movies in this book, and they all had endings where the audience smiles big and pumps their hands in the air. We’re ending Draculas with a nihilistic whimper, and I really think it’s gonna hurt us. This book was too much fun to end with such a downer…

Joe

• • •

Okay, I feel better now. I did a different ending which I think still offers a lot of sequel potential, but will make readers say “Hell yeah!” when they finish. As Mickey Spillane said, “A good beginning makes them buy the book. A good ending makes them buy the next book.”

It’s labeled Alternate Ending in the Dropbox. We can debate whether we use it, or a variation of it, for the final manuscript. If we don’t use it, at least it exists, and we can stick it in the extras.

Wife and son loved it, BTW.

Joe

September 24, 2010

I agree that the ending is the final taste a book leaves in the reader’s mouth. If it’s sour, it can taint all the flavors that came before. (Wow, look at me - maintaining a metaphor.)

I can buy this ending. Since peds is on the 2nd floor, I can buy Clay getting blown out and somehow surviving.

But he’d never hear Shanna through an intact thermopane window. Also, it wasn’t clear she got free of the trailer.

I did a couple of minor fixes in bold face that resolve those.

Paul

• • •

Good points, Paul. Your changes are spot-on.

My wife WOULD NOT stop talking about Clay living. She was so damn happy after reading the new ending, she smiled for—no shit—and hour after she finished.

She also says she loves you.

If Blake and Jeff are okay with it, I vote for Paul’s Altered Alternate ending to be the ending, and then the old ending to go into the extras. I also would like the dog epilogue I did that we cut to be an extra, and Paul’s scene where Shanna refuses to let Clay take her gun away to be an extra deleted scene.

Blake, you want me to put this together, then we can all start our final edits?

Jeff, you can finish the interview in the final edit.

Rock on!

Joe

• • •

Joe, you DO realize that you’re saying “But my family likes my writing!”

Just kidding, you big lug. Again, my issue was with an ambiguous ending, not a “Clay lives” one, so this all sounds good.

I finished the interview yesterday but didn’t send out a note saying I finished it. But now we have to revise the part where we said there were no disagreements.

Jeff

• • •

You guys have met my wife. She’s brutally honest, and she doesn’t put up with my BS.

However, I told my son if he didn’t say what I wanted, he was grounded.

And this wasn’t a disagreement. This was a meltdown on my part, that you guys were kind enough to tolerate.

The complete first draft with everything in it will be up tonight. Then Paul can have Saturday and Sunday to go through it and make changes. Jeff can have Monday and Tuesday. I’ll do Wednesday. Blake Thurs and Fri, and then off to the proofreader.

Joe

• • •