Loved it, but there's a loose end...

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Ron2112

Active Member
Apr 7, 2008
36
22
So I finally got around to reading Joyland and enjoyed it immensely. Nice, old-school, tight, linear SK fiction. BUT.....

...it strikes me that Annie's fate is left as a big, open question mark. I know Dev later got married to someone he met after graduating college, and even mentioned that he was dating someone when he got the news that Mike passed. But after they scatter his ashes, the book just ends. Even getting something like, "I turned around and Annie was gone," or "we kept in touch for a few years after, but the letters became less and less frequent and eventually stopped altogether" would have tied everything up.

Or did I miss something?
 

Ron2112

Active Member
Apr 7, 2008
36
22
Thanks, Ms. Mod. That's what I figured....it did seem a bit unlikely that Dev wouldn't mention what happened to Annie, given his propensity for hanging on to the relationships that are important to him. But thanks for the clarification. It didn't diminish my enjoyment of the book at all.
 

skimom2

Just moseyin' through...
Oct 9, 2013
15,683
92,168
USA
So I finally got around to reading Joyland and enjoyed it immensely. Nice, old-school, tight, linear SK fiction. BUT.....

...it strikes me that Annie's fate is left as a big, open question mark. I know Dev later got married to someone he met after graduating college, and even mentioned that he was dating someone when he got the news that Mike passed. But after they scatter his ashes, the book just ends. Even getting something like, "I turned around and Annie was gone," or "we kept in touch for a few years after, but the letters became less and less frequent and eventually stopped altogether" would have tied everything up.

Or did I miss something?
Loose ends are okay. How many times in life do we get the whole picture of anything? That seems to be an underlying theme in Mr. King's books since The Colorado Kid, and I respect it so much. It's honest.
 

Pucker

We all have it coming, kid
May 9, 2010
2,906
6,242
62
More than "okay," I think loose ends should be required.

If everything is tied up neatly at the end, then the story is over, and if I've learned anything more important than how to read, itself (I haven't . . . I don't think anyone has), it's that I never want the story to end. I want to be able to imagine what might have happened, or lacking that, at least to know that things still are happening-- somewhere -- to the people in the stories I come to love (or hate -- kind of the same thing).

Why else do you think Shane rides away at the end of that movie?

It's so the kid won't see (and know) the end of the story.

It's the same reason the concept of "hope" keeps popping up in these things.
 

doowopgirl

very avid fan
Aug 7, 2009
6,946
25,119
65
dublin ireland
More than "okay," I think loose ends should be required.

If everything is tied up neatly at the end, then the story is over, and if I've learned anything more important than how to read, itself (I haven't . . . I don't think anyone has), it's that I never want the story to end. I want to be able to imagine what might have happened, or lacking that, at least to know that things still are happening-- somewhere -- to the people in the stories I come to love (or hate -- kind of the same thing).

Why else do you think Shane rides away at the end of that movie?

It's so the kid won't see (and know) the end of the story.

It's the same reason the concept of "hope" keeps popping up in these things.
I completely agree about loose ends. Not only is the story finished, it doesn't stretch the imagination. I believe there can be more than one ending to a story. Shane is one of my favorite books. IMO, far better than the film. But you get to decide how everyone was affected by the interlude. Yes, loose ends are a good thing.
 

blunthead

Well-Known Member
Aug 2, 2006
80,755
195,461
Atlanta GA
Thanks, Ms. Mod. That's what I figured....it did seem a bit unlikely that Dev wouldn't mention what happened to Annie, given his propensity for hanging on to the relationships that are important to him. But thanks for the clarification. It didn't diminish my enjoyment of the book at all.
We must trust the author to know what we don't need to know, and to not know what we also don't know, and that in neither case does it matter.
 
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