Delia Sherman joined us aboard the Independence of the Seas for our question-and-answer installment on endings. The questions came from the attendees at the Writing Excuses Workshop, which was, lest anyone forget, on a cruise ship in the Caribbean.  The questions:

* Why do more short stories than novels end on tragic notes?

* How do you keep an ending from being predictable or boring?

* How do you write a stand-alone ending with sequel potential?

* What are the best ways to avoid infodump endings?

* Are there differences between writing the first novel in a series and other novels in the series?

* How do you know which questions to leave unanswered?

* What sort of attention do you give to your last lines?

This episode was engineered aboard The Independence of the Seas by Bert Grimm, and mastered in a soundproofed bullet-train by Alex Jackson.