Why is there a date discrepancy between Outlander and Cross Stitch with regard to the birth of Geillis Duncan?
The discrepancy in dates is a mistake–it’s a copy-editing error caused by differences between the British edition of the books (which begin in 1946) and the American ones (which begin in 1945). The reason being that the American book was already in galleys when we sold Outlander in the UK. The difference occurred after Reay Tannahill, a Scot who kindly proofread Cross Stitch before it was published in the UK, said that 1946 would have been a more accurate representation of conditions as I described them in Scotland. So I changed the date- -but the Americans wouldn’t let me change it for Outlander, saying that this would involve re-working all the dates, which would mean re-copy-editing the whole thing, and they didn’t want to do that.
