When I first read The Stand by Stephen King as a teen around 1980, it was already a hefty book at just over 800 pages long. At the time, it was easily the longest book I had read. What surpassed it? The uncut and revised version was published about 10 years later, which added 400+ pages. I, of course, ate that one up too. I would also devour the 47+ hour audiobook(Audible) version.
Strange as it may seem, I felt something was missing from the later versions despite their added length. What changed in later versions was that King updated the story's setting timeline. The first hardcover version of the story's setting was 1980. In 1980, the first paperback issue was set in 1985. Then the uncut version was later updated to 1990. This is fine, but because I read the first one, I always felt I was missing or looking for connections to my first read. I honestly hadn't looked into the timeline differences between different editions. As I was writing this I just learned the settings changed between the original hardcover, set in 1980, and this 1st edition paperback was 1985. So now the hardcover is on my wishlist.
This is like George Lucas revising and updating the later versions of the Star Wars trilogy and then hiding away or burying the earlier versions. The early version of The Stand, I believe, can only be found second-hand online or in a used bookstore
I recently watched the newer mini-series of The Stand that was pretty interesting, and I thought it was well done. So this added to my desire to revisit my original book, which I found on Ebay.
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