Would this somehow send out the wrong message?

Okay, so, I'm starting to get my doubts back after finishing my manuscript. Anyways...
For the whole book, the MC, who has depression and is suicidal, sometimes more often then others, has been trying to find a reason to stay alive. In the end of the book, he loses his reason that he found due to his own mistakes, so he kills himself. Then he gets famous.
With this being YA, I don't want to tell people that suicide, even though the MC did it, is okay. I also don't want people to think that a tragic end will get you famous, because if his "amazing" poetry didn't exist, he wouldn't have been famous. Basically, I don't want him to influence people to kill themselves.
Is this something I need to worry about? Like, I mean, is there a possibility that this could happen to where I need to be careful about it? If it is, what should I do?
Or am I just overreacting?
I guess what brings up this question is I'm worried that if/when I go to a publisher, they'll say it's promoting suicide, which is not my intention.
I tried looking up books with similar situations, but I didn't find any. I did read one at one time, though, (can't remember the title) where the MC killed himself at the end. But the thing is, he was sick and basically going to die anyway, so I don't feel like I can really compare the two. Is there any books out there that have a similar situation as this? Preferably YA.

 

Put a disclaimer stating that suicide is never the answer, and if you feel the
only answer is, then leave the suicide hotline number. There you have absolved
yourself from promoting such a touchy subject matter, by plainly speaking against
it. That is how they do it in music videos that talk about suicide.

Example is preset to where this message shows up to give you an idea of what I mean.

 

I'm gonna be honest, my gut reaction is an uncomfortable one. I can't help but project a bit. I think that would've been a pretty awful thing for me to read when I was a depressed, suicidal teenage writer desperate for my writing to be successful and without much concern for my own well-being. It absolutely would've strengthened, in my mind, the thought that I could be some tragic-romantic figure who died young and was only appreciated after my gruesome death.

Did you hear about that Netflix show 13 Reasons Why? Basically, we know that highly-publicized suicides can be 'contagious' and the CDC or some organization (I really cannot be bothered to google it at the moment) did a lot of research on ways to minimize the impact, so that these things can be written about and reported on without just causing more damage. I bring up 13 Reasons Why because it apparently did pretty much everything wrong. I'd suggest seeing if you can find that research and thinking about how it could be applied to your novel.

I'd think about what message you're trying to send. What are you trying to say with this story? Because, I mean, it's a tragedy. Maybe you wanted to write a tragedy? I don't know. But the "tormented artist kills themself and only then do they get the recognition they deserve" trope -- it's inherently tragic, and we like to think of it as less so because hey, this beautiful art came out of it! But that's a pretty shitty silver lining, frankly.

Is it supposed to be a depressing-as-shit ending? (Is there a market for that in YA? I totally don't know.) At least bittersweet? I'm just hoping it's not presented as cathartic closure because that's ... really not great.

eta: I don't intend to sound discouraging, but you understand that this is delicate material. I'd advise thinking less about potential publication or publicity issues and more about whether what you've written could be harmful to peoples' mental health, and whether you're okay with it if it could. I don't know how you could 'fix' your story to keep it from being a downer, because that kinda seems like that's what you were going for. If this is the story you want to tell, then tell it. All I can tell you is that I'd be incredibly wary of putting something into the world that I know has a high likelihood of hurting people.

 

I think any plot idea can be made to sound a million different ways. How you described it was... maybe not how it's supposed to come across? I hate to assume that too because you came up with it. Maybe if you included the reason why you're telling that story, what is the moral or theme? If I were to learn something from it what would it be? I think that's what I'd need to see.

It sounds like it's meant to be tragic. He's a young man that created beautiful work when he was alive, but he took his own life and it so happened that his work caught on. Now he's unable to reap the benefits of his own success. The biggest problem is that I think there are a ton of ways someone can interpret the message and because suicide is a touchy topic depending on your culture and personal experience. You will never be able to handle it in a way everyone approves of, but as long as you tackle it with the upmost respect and delicacy it should turn out.

Another thing is, did his work become famous specifically because he committed suicide? If he had waited for the storm to pass, would he have had a happier ending where his work was recognized regardless of his death?

 

There's...a lot. One I can think off the top of my head that stems from what happened to make him kill himself would be "don't try to get revenge," as it was him getting revenge on someone and it backfiring really, really badly.
I almost want to say it was sheer guilt that drove him to suicide.

No, it became famous because of how good it was. There was several factors that got him to his level of fame, which the fact that he was so young when he died was one, but that wasn't what initially did it.

 

Yeah, 13 Reasons Why. I'm surprised that didn't come up in your search. I guess it's not technically the MC who kills herself, but sort of. Her narrative, as told through cassette tapes she recorded before she committed suicide, took up roughly equal page space as the still-living MC who listens to the tapes. (I think. It's been a few years since I read it.)

I'm wondering how you pulled this off, POV-wise. Who's narrating the book after your MC dies? Were they a POV character all along, or is it more like an omniscient narrator epilogue or something? I think 13 Reasons was salable partly because it did have the dual POV format, so there was a hopeful if bittersweet ending for one of the narrators at least. Like @izzybot was saying, I'm not sure how much of a market there is for depressing-as-shit endings. They exist, but they do make for a harder sell.

Also I just want to say that if you do decide you have a problem, it's probably fixable. It's too soon for you to be fretting about this.

 

13 Reasons Why did come up. In fact, it was the only book I recognized. The thing is, I feel like I can’t compare it as well to mine because the MC is dead from the very beginning, or shortly after the book starts (I don’t know. I never read/watched it). I just feel like, “well, she’s dead. She can't come back. The reader couldn’t ever hope she’d make it though because, she was, in fact, dead already.” My MC isn’t dead until the last page of the last chapter. I feel like there's that hope that whatever happens to him, he'll make it through. It's just that, what happened was too much for him.

The story is told in first person, in the MC's POV. For the epilogue, I just went to an omniscient narrator. I had to have that to explain things that happened involving the MC and other characters afterwards.

 

Agreed. The author should not be responsible for the actions of others. From what you wrote, OP, the message I'm getting is that people are only worth remembering if they commit an action - in this case, suicide - that can be popularized or romanticized by the media, thus giving other folks the spotlight at the benefit of a loss of life. Frankly, I think your premise is fine, but I think it's the execution you should be more concerned about. It's one thing to think one's premise is worrisome and other to actually have written something worrisome. My two cents.

 

So I'm guessing you've never experienced depression or any of the other conditions that can make someone vulnerable to suggestion. Well....good for you, but maybe you should educate yourself a bit on the experiences of other people?

And it doesn't have to be a simplistic "This book made suicide sound cool, let's do it!". It can be one of many little things people take in, that leave someone with a cumulative impression that suicide is glamorous and romantic. And when they're in a bad state or suffering with mental health issues to the point where they start to consider that they don't want to go on, that impression might just be what tips the balance.

 

I think you could probably write the ending in such a way that you make it clear he should have stayed alive. Like, he never got to enjoy success because he quit too early. People like his poems, but BFD since he can't enjoy that. Have a scene where people are discussing one of the poems and can't remember the poet's name. Have a scene where people are meeting about publishing his poems and say they're great but they aren't going to bother publishing them because they want to support the work of someone who's still around and can help promote/produce more work/whatever. That sort of thing.

Otherwise? Regardless of whether you personally are worried about the impact of your work, I expect publishers would be. And if you're writing YA, you probably want to work with a publisher - it's not one of the markets that generally does well via self-publishing.

 

Well, why'd you write it then? Just change the ending to 'Jake leaped from the cliff, and landed on the ledge. Poetry fluttered out his pockets, the folios caught on the wind, and it began to rain. He was free from poetry.' THE END

'Oh my god that was so moving I thought, I really thought he was going to kill himself. Suppose his poetry must have been pretty lousy really.'

Or two endings? 'Jake's brain spattered contents over the ledge. Chief Inspector Collins scrolled through the mobile telephone searching for clues to the suicide. 'Heh,' he said, 'heh heh,' he said, 'dammit, some of the kid's poems is kind of entertaining, moving - I might say. Shame the little prick killed himself. Maybe I'll Twitter some of these couplets? It's what he would have wanted.'

 

So, as long as I don't romanticize his death at all and make it clear that he would've been able to reap the benefits of his poetry becoming famous if he was still alive, I should be fine?

 

I'm no kind of authority, but I certainly think that would HELP.

But then it'd be kinda a downer ending, which may not be the best. You're absolutely committed to him going through with the suicide?

 

Leaving aside the issues around suicide/mental health (I think you do need to be careful on this), I'm bothered by the statement above. If you need a narrator to explain the ending then does that implies a failure in the storytelling?

 

I have some other alternative ends, but they all involve him dying except for one. It's pretty much supposed to be a tragedy. It sort of reminds me of the Romeo and Juliet type tragedy.
The thing is, he kills himself because his "reason" for staying alive is his wife, and she was murdered because of something he did. So, he feels really guilty and he can't justify living without her, and he thinks he should die so he can be with her on the other side or whatever. So, I'm stuck with him thinking his death is justifiable. In the alternative ending I have that doesn't have him die, he decides to stay alive and keep trying to publish his poetry for his wife, because she's the one that wanted him to publish it. That would probably be a more "happy" ending, since he "beat" suicide, but given that the MC is suicidal already and basically clings onto his lover and already said he can't live without her, it doesn't really make much sense, in my opinion.

I'm confused. How does that constitute a failure? The MC can't narrate the epilogue because he's dead. I mean, I could do some beyond the grave narration, but since I have to talk about some people who aren't him, I didn't think that was the best option.

 

They got married at 18. Yeah, the MC is basically dependent on his lover. That’s why I think it would make him inconsistent in a way if I let him live at the end.

 

I don't know your story, so that was a genuine question. I'm not a great fan of epilogues in general, but as you presented it I understood that there were various unresolved plotlines that could only be cleared up in an epilogue. I find that sort of device generally unsatisfying. If your MC has left the stage and the story is over, why do you need an epilogue to tidy things up for multiple characters and explain the ending?

Clearly this works for you, I was just asking the question.

 

Could it be adult fiction? I never thought of it, to be honest. The book starts when the MC is almost 16, but he pretty much is treated like an adult, which is why I’m asking. He doesn’t have parents or anything to depend on. I just always had in my mind that it’s most definitely YA because the MC is a teen for most of the book.

 

I can’t change his age. Would that make it so that I need to set a good example or could I still get away with it being “edgy?” The story in itself even without the suicide is still pretty edgy in my opinion.

 

Glitter goes see the Censor

Suzie was fourteen forty when she lost her virginity. She suffered depression mood adjustments, and contemplated suicide scratching at her ankle. And also she hated priests was a regular church-goer when driving her diesel car bicycle. Many times she never drank alcohol urine

 

Okay yeah, the second you said "wife" I was like HOLD UP lol. This doesn't sound like YA, even if the characters are teenagers. There is a lot of adult fiction out there starring teenagers, so character age alone doesn't determine the category. You have to look at the voice and storytelling style as well.

There are next to no out-and-out rules in YA (you can find exceptions to everything, except I think straight-up erotica), but there are a lot of conventions, and each one you break makes it harder to sell the book. There are a number of unconventional things you've mentioned about your book: the MC's age progression (YA rarely covers large spans of time), you mentioning that he's treated like an adult, the fact that's he married, the fact that it's a tragedy, the omniscient POV epilogue. Again, you can find exceptions to all these, but all of them added together makes it quite unusual. That doesn't necessarily mean it's not YA; that's impossible to say without more information. You'll want to make sure you get beta readers who are very familiar with YA, though, and see what they say.

So, if this is adult fiction, do you have less of a problem on your hands? Maybe. Adults tend to be less suggestible than teenagers, and there are definitely fewer "moral guardians" keeping an eye on what gets published for adults. But I and many others would argue that glamorizing suicide is icky for any age group, so I still think you need to tread carefully. I really like the suggestions @BayView gave you for getting the message across.

 

OP, I think the issue here is figuring out the genre of the story and your expected age of the audience. If it's YA, then you do run the risk of some backlash for utilizing dark themes. Granted, it's not the first to be an edgy YA novel, but maybe it would work best if it was adult fiction? I've read your other posts that the MC is a teen for the majority of the novel, but I think the direction you're going really depends on how you want your novel to be seen as. If it's YA and dealing with themes of suicide, then many readers will see it as a tale of caution/a story for guidance. If it's adult fiction, then readers will see a tragic story about a man who lost his wife and ultimately killed himself. I think this issue is a good example of how genre and the age of the audience really come into play in determining what kind of story it will be.

 

Suicide is the result of a mental illness. It is unlikely that your book will be the trigger for anyone's suicide. If anything, it sounds like your premise exhibits the benefits of staying alive. Suicide is a real problem and if you have some insight into the causes, please share.