Happy Endings—are they good for us?

This comment caught my eye, from a Publishers Weekly review of Bridget Asher’s The Pretend Wife. 

It’s more than a little disappointing...that Asher inserts an improbably happy ending.

Ouch. I’m not sure which word is more distressing in that sentence: “disappointing” or “improbably.” And here’s another comment on happy endings, this one from Josh Henkin, author of Matrimony:

Nothing is more depressing than a happy ending that feels tacked on, and there can be great comfort in literature that doesn’t admit to easy solutions, just as our lives don’t.                                       From I Laughed! I Cried – 9/19/08.

Fortunately, Henkin isn’t discounting happy endings per se, only those that feel forced or “tacked on” (i.e., improbable). Still, there’s the suggestion that happy endings are “easy solutions.”

Some questions for Book Clubs . . .

1. What kind of books do you like to read? Ones with happy endings—always ... mostly ... sometimes?
2. What about the great works of literature…so many end on unhappy notes? Does that mean books with happy endings aren’t considered good literature?
3. Do all happy endings feel manipulative, or as Henkin says, ”tacked on”? Can books end happily in a natural, unforced manner?