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My book club turned into a shouting match over a missing chapter
Back in October, our group of 8 met at Beth's place in Portland to discuss a historical novel set in the 1800s. Halfway through the meeting, Margaret pulled out her copy and pointed out that the paperback edition skipped chapter 12 entirely, while the rest of us had the full version. Turns out the publisher released a trimmed edition for bookstores, and we'd been debating a character's motive that only made sense with that missing chapter. I sat there with my highlighted pages feeling totally lost, and then two members started arguing about whether the author intended the cut. I finally pulled up the author's interview on my phone where she said the chapter was removed against her wishes, and that shut everyone up for a minute. We spent the next hour re-reading the chapter aloud in rotation, which was awkward but actually way more fun than the original plan. Has anyone else had a version mismatch wreck a discussion, or do we just have the most dramatic club in the Pacific Northwest?
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mason_jackson1mo ago
Is it just me, or does this kind of thing happen way more than we admit, like with recipes that skip a step or instructions that are missing one tiny detail? It's almost like every version of a thing has its own little trap door, and you don't find it until you're already deep in the middle of something. Reading that chapter out loud together probably saved the night, but it also shows how much we rely on everyone having the exact same copy of reality. Maybe that's why book clubs are so great, they force us to admit when our pieces don't line up and then we have to slow down and actually work through it together.
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