Starting with the end

When writers get together to discuss writing, sooner or later they will start to discuss planning. Some will shudder and say they can't bear to be tied to a plan; others will look anxious and say they have to know exactly what's going to happen before they start.

Many - Philip Pullman is one - will say that they don't know exactly what's going to happen, and it would be boring if they did: but they do need to know how their story will end.

The ending of Casablanca - brilliant, as is everything else about this film:
'Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.'

So here to help as ever, I'm going to give you a list of endings. (They are real ones.) All you have to do is write the story that leads up to the one you choose. Also as ever, my advice would be to start with a spider chart to help you gather ideas - but that's up to you!

• It had never occurred to him that a dog could be clairvoyant.
• I turned and walked away through the rain.
• It was all right.
• And everything, every smallest detail, would be written on my heart forever.
• I turned the key in the ignition and drove off.
• From hate to love - the journey was only just starting. 
• There should be no need to dig there ever again.
• I put out my hand to stop her getting up and I cross the room to answer the phone.
• 'Now how about another drink? I'm as thirsty as hell.'

(Adapted from an exercise in The Five-Minute Writer, by Margret Geraghty.)