I tend to approach fiction in a deterministic, mathematical style: these are the constants, these are the variables, and these are how they add and subtract from each other. By the time I reach the ending, I want to know what happened, why, and what the outcome was. I’m not fond of open questions, unless the question sets up another equation in the setting’s future.
To give an example of what did work for me, I once read a story where physicists accidentally discover how to generate a field that makes gunpowder combust. The story follows how society reacts to the discovery, and what good and bad things happen when guns are effectively eliminated as a weapon. The story ends with the same research revealing a targeted assassination method against an individual’s DNA, with the open question being whether and how this knowledge can be managed. To me, that’s a good setup for a future equation, illuminated by the events that came before and the lessons that came from trying to control another dangerous technology.
Re: Favorite endings?
To give an example of what did work for me, I once read a story where physicists accidentally discover how to generate a field that makes gunpowder combust. The story follows how society reacts to the discovery, and what good and bad things happen when guns are effectively eliminated as a weapon. The story ends with the same research revealing a targeted assassination method against an individual’s DNA, with the open question being whether and how this knowledge can be managed. To me, that’s a good setup for a future equation, illuminated by the events that came before and the lessons that came from trying to control another dangerous technology.