Outlander Book Club: Book 1, Chapter 20 breakdown

Connecting to the Outlander TV series

This chapter was used in part for Outlander Season 1, Episode 8. However, there were some substantial changes.

The first is that we get to see some of Frank’s activities. It’s been about six weeks and Frank is still in Scotland looking for Claire. He doesn’t want to believe that Claire has left him for some other man. He wants to believe that she’s been taken.

There are some questions from fans as to why we focus on Frank. There are a few reasons for this.

The first is that there would always be people wondering what Frank was doing. Knowing that Frank is needed for later points in the show/book, it’s important to grow his character early. That’s impossible if it was all told from Claire’s point of view, but the show has a chance to give us a look at what sends Frank back to Oxford. We get a sense of why he decides to give up searching for Claire.

At the same time, we get to see that there is a darkness to him. When he’s scammed by a woman, he is able to fight back due to his training in MI-5. This is not a man you want to mess with.

We also get what is one of my favorite moments in the show. Claire and Frank are on either side of the stones. Whether Frank and Claire can hear each other isn’t that clear, but it’s beautifully shot. There’s this hope that Claire can return to her own time; that she’ll get the one thing she’s wished for since landing through the stones.

And I think that’s why Claire’s storyline is changed slightly. She doesn’t figure out that she’s close to Fort William so is close to the stones. She sees the stones and decides to make a run for them. This feels much more realistic than Claire hopping along the stones in a river for a few miles to get home; at least, it does for me.

Plus, the show didn’t leave Claire alone. That didn’t make a lot of sense for me, either. One of the men either from the rent side of things or from the group going off with Jamie should have stayed behind. Jamie knew the land wasn’t safe and yet he chose to leave his wife alone. Sure, she should have been covered and protected, but wild animals could have definitely shown up.

The show opting for Willie to stay behind gave us a little more time to get to know him. It was hard not to feel sorry for him when he had to tell Jamie he’d lost Claire, but it also made it easier for Jamie to guess where Claire had been taken.

For the TV show, what the writers adapted made more sense. It’s a different medium of storytelling and it works as both a book fan and a show-first fan. However, that doesn’t stop the book chapter from being exciting.

What did you think during your reading of Outlander Book 1, Chapter 20? Share in the comments below.

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