10 Endings Stephen King Actually Got Right

10. 11.22.63

Jake Epping is a classic King character in a relatively recent novel. He is given the chance/task to travel back through time and prevent the assassination of President Kennedy, an event that is described in the novel as a turning point in the history of the world - one that effected everything that followed for the worse.

The catch is that Jake can't choose the time he goes back to. It will always be 1958 when he arrives, so if he travels back into the future, he will not be able to get back to the life he quickly establishes for himself.

While in the past and preparing for his date with destiny, he meets, saves and falls in love with Sadie. This sets a chain of events into effect, which sadly results in her death, though Kennedy is ultimately saved. Time pushes back against Jake though, as when he returns to the future, he sees that the world has been all but destroyed with Kennedy's survival.

The real question of the novel then is not whether or not to save JFK, but whether or not it is right to save Sadie. It was only Jake's initial intervention that kept her alive anyway. His decision to let her fate unravel as it is ends up leading, in the novel's final scene, to a beautiful reunion, if not a conscious one, then one of souls. Jake does, in a way, get his happy ending.