Competition: Seeking closure

In Competition No. 2732 you were invited to submit a comically appalling final paragraph to the worst of all possible novels. This challenge is a twist on the magnificent annual Bulwer-Lytton contest, which salutes the memory of the 19th-century writer Edward Bulwer-Lytton, author of the much-parodied opening: ‘It was a dark and stormy night…’ Entrants are invited to come up with deliberately dreadful openings to imaginary novels. It was a most enjoyable competition to judge. I was entertained by some truly vile abuses of the English language, the best-worst of which appear below and earn their authors £25 apiece. Dishonourable mentions to Charles Chadwick, Adam Campbell, R.S. Gwynn, W.J. Webster and Katie Mallett. The bonus fiver goes to Basil Ransome-Davies.

Clive stood among the smoking ruins of the Taj Mahal and regarded the blood-drenched corpses of the Venusian neo-Nazi zombies, the lethal work of his shadow — the shadow that lurked in the recesses of his mind, both regressive and creative.  Violence had always been forbidden to him, yet when called upon he had dispensed it in the name of justice and humanity, doubtless an example of the enantiodromia that balanced out and purified pathological extremes. With an expression that was both a bitter grimace of repudiation and the serene acceptance of a heightened moral awareness, he flung down the AK47 and strode out, uplifted by a clarified, transcendental vision, into the radiant sunrise, towards the ocean where the dolphins with their secret wisdom would welcome him and heal the hurt that lingered with the stinging pain of a physical wound in the secret depths of his soul.  
Basil Ransome-Davies

And so, with the reconciliation of Fredegond and Arabella, things had come full circle.