The friend of my friend. . .

[rolanni]

Off on another part of Teh Intertubes, a colleague is writing the last book of a series, and is experiencing separation grief.

During our interview at ConQuesT, I made the comment in reply to. . .something, that readers and writers have a different relationship with the writer’s characters; with readers experiencing something like a traditional, real-world “friendship” with those characters they’ve come to like.  The relationship between an author and her characters is more nearly collaborative, and while I do love my children, I don’t worry about them to the extent that some readers report.

Back at. . . Duckon, I think it was, a few years ago, I happened to overhear a young lady in the hallway between panels who was being congratulated by her colleagues for having made an author on a previous panel (on what I suppose was fan fic) break down and cry.  “She had to be made to understand,” the young lady was saying, very sternly, “that she doesn’t own those characters just because she made them up.  They belong to us, because we give them life!”  (Yes, I did check.  No, I didn’t start in with the young lady then and there.  This is entirely due to the fact that Steve grabbed my arm and pulled me down the hall to our next event.)

All of these things, though, speak to the “reality” of fictional characters, and the hold they have over the minds and hearts of readers (and writers, too, if we do only make them up).  My colleague who is wrapping up the series wonders what will happen to their beloved characters in the minds of readers, once their story is told; and if readers will also experience grief, knowing that this is the last book.

I have my own opinions on this (quelle surprise!), but I’d like to hear yours:  How do you handle the ending of a series?  What’s your relationship with — and your responsibilities toward — people who live in books?

Originally published at Sharon Lee, Writer. You can comment here or there.

Comments

Right...

[schizopenguin.livejournal.com]

I'm waiting for Ann Aguirre's Siranta Jax last book. I want to know what will happen. Surely I'll experience some degree of sadness to see it end, but they'll live in my mind. It's a shared trip for me, and the books are always at hand if I want to reread them, right?

Fan fiction might help some people to deal with this sort of "grief". But fanficcers have to understand that it's the author who owns the characters. If they don't like the way the author handles the characters, tough. They can stop reading and that's the end of it. Fanficcers sometimes takes the wrong turn somewhere and end in lalaland, don't waste your time in getting angry at them. It's useless for one, and extremely upsetting for another. When some of them reach this level it’s because they live in a complete separate universe. (repeat with me: Ommmmmmmmmm Ommmmmmm Ommmm Mantras are good)

This is true too bout readers. They ALSO believe sometimes that the author owes them. That the author should write on-demand waht they want to read. They handle it slightly different to fanficcers, but just to some extent.

IMHO, and while I don't try to offend anyone, they are slightly delusional in making these demands. I do believe that they have the right of making their own "stories" privately, without attempting to steal the rights of the owners or trying to impose them their own vision of how the story should be written. I mean this in the old time bardic tradition of retelling tales/myths.

However, I also believe that those so involved with stories, should try their hand at it. With their own characters, plot, and everything. I bet they'll start respecting the authors a little bit more after such exercise. (I’m not a native speaker, so I apologize for the mistakes)