Outlander Book Club: Voyager Chapter 61 breakdown

Foreshadowing in the Outlander chapter

Most of this chapter is focused on storylines from earlier in the chapter. There’s a fair bit of time focused on the Campbells and the smuggling traitor.

However, there is a little bit of foreshadowing toward the end of the chapter. Ishmael talks about how Claire is a seer. She won’t come into her power just yet. She needs to stop bleeding first. This is something Geillis mentioned in the previous chapter.

During Drums of Autumn, Claire hears something similar. Nayawenne tells Claire that she’ll come into her powers when her hair turns white. There are later references to it in other books. Voyager is just the first book that really touches on Claire’s abilities.

Adapting the Voyager chapter

Not all of this chapter was adapted. Outlander Season 3 kept the murderer storyline out of it, which meant there wasn’t the big reveal at the house. In a way, I’m glad the show kept it out. It didn’t feel detrimental to the story, and the show has to reduce storylines considerably. It wasn’t the same as Dragonfly in Amber with the rape in Paris scene, which had a bigger knock-on effect on various characters and explained what happened to the Duke of Sandringham.

Yi Tien Cho’s story was adapted considerably for the series, too. Instead of having him as the traitor, he fell in love with Margaret and remained in Jamaica with him. I did prefer the way the show handled Yi Tien Cho’s story overall. Claire’s descriptions of Yi Tien Cho were too caricaturish.

The end of the chapter was partly adapted. We did get to see a ritual happening, but it wasn’t as detailed on the TV show. However, the show did include the flashback to Claire watching the dancers at the stones in the Outlander series premiere, and I appreciated that moment.

What did you spot while reading Voyager Chapter 61? Let us know in the comments below.

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