I’ve spent the last month hanging at the edge of an ending.
That sounds dramatic, I know—but if you’ve ever written the final book in a long series, you understand how endings stop being a destination and start becoming a reckoning.
For nine books, these characters have followed me everywhere. They’ve ridden along in my quiet moments, waiting at stoplights, standing in line at the grocery store, speaking to me when I should have been sleeping. Their stories grew the way real lives do: messy, layered, sometimes refusing to resolve on schedule. And now, suddenly, I’m here at the last book. My last deliberate chance to decide what happens to them on the pages that will soon be published.
This book has come with a mix of urgency and restraint. Every day I sit down knowing two things are true at the same time: readers deserve answers, and stories like this never truly end. I’ve been tying threads together that were first knitted years ago. Some were quiet choices that didn’t seem to demand explanation. Other revelations felt inevitable, as if the story had been patiently waiting for me to circle back.
But alongside that pull toward closure is something harder to ignore: the knowledge that this world still breathes. There are side characters who stepped into the light just long enough to show me they had more to say. There are consequences that ripple outward instead of neatly settling. There are questions that don’t beg for answers so much as they dare someone to ask them differently. As a writer, I feel responsible not just for resolving what I promised—but for not strangling the future in the process.
That’s the tension I’ve been living in. So, do I close every door, bolt every window, and give the kind of ending that says, This is done? Or do I leave a few things slightly ajar—enough space for a continuation, a spin-off, a story told from another angle or another voice?
The truth is, real life rarely gives us perfect endings. We get understanding and acceptance, if we’re lucky. But there’s almost always more story waiting beyond the last page. I want this final book to feel complete without feeling sealed. I want readers to be able to set it down with satisfaction—but its hard for me to let go of the possibilities and stories that haven’t been written.
This month has reminded me that endings aren’t about tying everything into a bow. They’re about honoring what came before while trusting what might come next. Whether this truly is the last time I write in this series, or simply the last time I do so in this way, I don’t know yet. What I do know is that these characters have earned an ending that feels honest. And maybe—just maybe—they’ve earned the chance to surprise us again someday.
