Where this was said
Ambiguous Endings and the Art of Writing Uncertainty
At 28:30 · chapter starts 27:20
The conversation turns to Paul's signature ambiguous endings, which Alaina frames as his being 'the king of ambiguous endings.' Paul explains that in A Head Full of Ghosts, he deliberately divorced himself from having a true answer because he didn't want it to leak through — the book's horror lives precisely in not knowing. For The Cabin at the End of the World, he underestimated how upset readers would be about the world-ending ambiguity, because to him the story was always about what the two husbands decided to do. For The Pallbearers Club, he's pretty sure she's a vampire — but readers can decide for themselves. He then gives his most eloquent statement of intent: ambiguity works as horror because it mirrors what life is actually like. We have beliefs, but ultimately we just don't know. He's clear that ambiguity should never be a cheap gimmick — if he's going to ask 300 pages of a reader, the open ending has to be earned.
