Short Story:Final Reward

A short story by Terry Pratchett, in which the author of a wildly popular series of fantasy novels has a midlife crisis, decides he doesn't want to do this any more, and deliberately ends the series by killing off his much-loved central character.

Then there is a knock on the door....

Republished in 'A Blink of the Screen'.

In 2015 a student, Ladislav Plecitý, created a live action adaptation of this story.

Annotation

The collection contains a short story, Final Reward, in which an author of heroic fantasy fiction decides to kill off the barbarian hero who made his literary name, so as to focus on more serious writings. And then the Barbarian Hero turns up on his doorstep to complain about being killed off....

Compare this story told about Robert E. Howard, creator of the ur-barbarian hero, Conan of Cimmeria.

"He's alone one night, and he feels a shadow overtake him from behind, and he knows that Conan stands behind him, with a large axe. And Conan tells him "Stay there, and write!""

(Quoted in the journal of weird things, Fortean Times, January 2013, p53.)