Well, perhaps it's just the type of books I read, but I always know with almost one hundred per certainty that everything will turn out all right in the end. In my experience, the vast majority of books are written this way, so to get vexed over whether or not the hero or heroine will survive happy right to the end of the book seems a bit unnecessary. If, on the rare occasion I'm wrong (although I can't think of one single book I've read where I was wrong), then so be it. Hero dies? Doesn't solve the mystery? Doesn't get the girl? I can handle it.
Now, of course, there are degrees of resolution and happiness, and that's what makes the journey through the book interesting and gripping - to see the ups and downs the hero and/or heroine go through, and to find out what happens to them at the end. If I knew at the outset what the exact point of arrival was going to be, then I'd feel like I was missing out on some of the suspense and intrigue which I enjoy so much.
I can think of just two instances where things don't turn out happily when I thought they would - one was a wonderfully romantic film and the other was Becky's Per Astra thingy-whatsit fic. Both times I felt horribly let down and wouldn't want to watch/read them again, but that doesn't stop me remembering them with fondness - after all, I enjoyed everything about them except the last ten minutes or so.
Yvonne
