I recently re-read a story that I haven't picked up for about 4 years. Ah, what memories. The book doesn't have a title, because it never got an ending. I started it when I was 12 - having stumbled upon the brilliant idea of writing a Historical Fiction novel. I didn't realize then that my story line was painfully predictable. Or that a 12 year olds writing style is utterly undeveloped, or that a 12 year old shouldn't exactly undertake the challenge of writing a full length novel (!). However, I was inspired, excited, high on ambition, and ready to pursue an impossible dream.
My inspiration lasted for a glorious year and a half. Then it abruptly abandoned me. I was simply out of ideas. It was far too early to end the book. But what else was there to do? I couldn't even think of a decent conclusion to my story... so I laid it to rest in a huge 3-ring binder, where it remains to this day.
Four years later, I read it, and laugh, and smile at the pages in childish sentimentality. There are precisely two obvious endings:
1) to let everybody live, and make it 'happily ever after', or
2) kill all my favorite people off.
I prefer the latter option, because I am incapable of creating a happy-ever-after ending that isn't sappy, (I despise sappy endings) and it is much more convenient to annihilate everybody, as it saves you the trouble and obligation of writing a sequel.