The End of the Book

Books always end differently than movies.  I just finally got out to see The Help in the theater with my daughter yesterday.  As I watched, my mind counted all of the differences in the plot from book.  The book was so good.  The movie was better.  No the book was better.  Well let me explain.

The book was better because it was more intimate.  It was a journey we went on with the writer through subtle nuances and descriptions. Meeting characters who were complicated and flawed.

The movie was better because at the end you felt like crying and cheering and hugging people.  The characters who in the book were simply part of the culture neither good nor bad but definitely not inspiring, in the movie became almost heroic.

Sometimes when a book is THAT good people want to make it into a movie but for some reason they feel the need to change endings.

Book endings are often too sad, or not satisfying enough perhaps.

I have a feeling I know how my book will end now.  I’ve been waiting.  It’s been an incredible story that has touched people’s lives and inspired them even.  I’ve heard from many how my story has given them hope and how it sounds like a movie.

The problem is it’s a book.  And I don’t think people will pay money to see this ending.  I may be wrong.  I’ve been wrong before.  But somehow I don’t think so this time.

I haven’t spoken to Martin in a week.  Since he kissed me goodbye.  A first since we met.  Not even so much as an email in the last 5 days.  He had doubts about us and disappeared.  Which has given me some time to foster my own doubts.  Perhaps rightly so replaying events of this past month back in my head with new clarity.

When I first met him the one thing he said he liked the most about me was my ability to say what was on my mind.  The movie The Help also had a man say that to Skeeter when he found out how smart she was and different from other girls.  It is what attracted him to her –  and what drove him away.  She wrote a book that caused an uproar and he didn’t appreciate her doing it at all and certainly without telling him about it.  He left her.

Men say they like a woman who is upfront, smart, and who speaks her mind.  They think they will like it.  I don’t think I will ever believe another man who tells me that.

In the end of my book it will be my undoing.  You can give a man all the love in the world, adore him, make him feel sexy and strong and needed…but what they really want is what feels comfortable.  And if you speaking your mind makes them feel uncomfortable the game is over.  Nobody wants to feel uncomfortable for long.

I should have been looking for a man who wasn’t so willing to please.  Wasn’t so needing to be loved.  I should have seen that no matter how many times he told me he would just make a joke out of it and kiss me and that he could handle me and that I wouldn’t be too much for him….I should have seen that it was too much even for him.  Maybe for anyone.

What attracted him to you in the first place will be what drives him nuts.  I am another living testimony to that truth.

It will be a surprise ending that will make women slam their books shut and curse my name and all the time they wasted reading the book.  Most of my friends will stare at me with mouths gaping open.  My mother will tell me she told me so.

As my son says – an epic failure.

My sadness is speaking today.  Not my hope.  My promise for the future is secure.  I know I’m going to be okay.  But that won’t be enough for the readers.  They want to see a happy ending and that means guy moves to America, gets the girl and they live happily ever after.

And that’s why my story will never be a movie.  Well, that is unless they change the ending.

Just a hunch.  Stay tuned. I’ll let you know.