Differences between the text and the audio books

[frobisherw]

I've only noticed two big differences between the text and the audio book, both associated with the tables of Seven Ten lists -- likely because it isn't possible to get across the same point purely in audio as is done with a visual table.

I'll likely update this post with transcripts of what the audio books do, as well as the original text -- but I'd love to hear any comments from others about the topic!

Comments

[buhrger]

i actually have the text straight from the Author's mouth email account, and can put it up if folks figure it's not a violation of copyright.

[frobisherw]

I think that would be a clear case of Fair Use, especially if combined with commentary on the differences. Please do post it!

first one, starting on page 77, bold is unchanged from the original

[buhrger]

“I’ll believe that when I see it. Bring up the full grid.”
The walls obeyed. The eight lists appeared around us, ten names in each, slim obelisks of print erected by the sweat and labors of the thousand columnists and editors who had toiled to make each of these newspapers loom high on the world’s horizons. The first seven names were the same in all the lists, as always, different only in their order, the six Hive Leaders and the Anonymous jockeying for place as each newspaper published its estimation of each Hive’s real power this year, strongest to least. MASON, of course, is first among these equals, the primus inter pares holding the top of six lists this year, rivaled only by the Anonymous who took first place in the provocative opinions of the Humanist paper, the Olympian, and of Europe’s classic Le Monde. The rest were variable, Chair Kosala, Chief Director Hotaka Andō Mitsubishi and Duke President Ganymede ranging from high ranks to low as Shanghai Daily, El País or The Romanov voiced prudence, criticism, praise or pettiness in the unsubtle subtleties of this subjective ranking best to least. Slots six and seven usually went to the minor Hive leaders, Europe’s unpopular Prime Minister Casimir Perry, or Gordian’s Brillist Headmaster Felix Faust, leader of the smallest Hive that has a leader, but Black Sakura made a peculiar jab at the Cousins by ranking Chair Kosala seventh of the Big Seven, and their own Mitsubishi Chief Director second after Caesar.
True variety came in the last three slots, eight nine and ten, where each column selected from the wide world which three names seemed most important after heads of state. Statespersons still dominated, like Charlemagne Guildbreaker and Speaker Jin Im-Jin, or semi-statepersons like our own Censor Ancelet and Commissioner General Papadelias. Celebrities mingled with them—Sniper of course, and Sawyer Dongala—artists and creators too—Orland Vives, Lune Cassirer, Ting Ting Foster, even dear Hugo Sputnik, the only Utopian to make the lists if you don’t count the tenth slot in the Masonic paper, Audite Nova, reserved as always in memoriam for the honored dead. Black Sakura did stand out, a radically different ordering of the Big Seven from any other paper, even the other Mitsubishi paper Shanghai Daily, and no one else listed any of Black Sakura’s strange last three: Minister of Education Darcy Sok, the Crown Prince of Spain Leonor Valentín, and Deputy Censor Jung Su-Hyeon Ancelet-Kosala. It was an odd list, but honestly I would not have dwelled much on it, not without this theft to draw my attention away from those two lists that command us all to read them first. No one wants to. We want to read our own Hive papers first, feel loyal, Cousins looking to Rosetta Forum, Humanists to The Olympian, Masons to Audite Nova, but we know, we all know, most of these voices are the haste and showmanship of journalism, fun, meaty, but human. Only two voices here are prophets, the oracles of our age, to be consulted first and last in all things, even if we scowl at being forced to act like grownups and pretend we like our nasty medicine. We have to read the Anonymous, reader, and we have to read the Newsletter of Brill’s Institute. Who do they list as numbers eight, nine and ten? Oh, sensible choices: Blacklaw Tribune Natekari, Conclave Head Julia Doria-Pamphili, Sniper of course, the King of Spain, and J.E.D.D. Mason. He is on three lists, can you believe that, reader? J.E.D.D. Mason on only three lists? Well, it is to be expected. They are wrong. All the lists are wrong, you know that. You know already one name which should be on all of them, but never could be: Bridger.

second one, starting on page 83, bold is unchanged from the original

[buhrger]

“Show me the totals, Mycroft,” the Censor ordered. “Where it’s going?”
I raised the chart before him, columns listing the population, land holdings and income of each Hive at this moment, and projected a year from now. It shows the disproportions: the vast Masonic Hive with 31% of Earth’s population and threatening to grow; the Mitsubishi modest in membership but with more than half Earth’s property in their land-greedy hands; and tiny Utopia rich with inventions, copyrights and hardworking vocateurs, with less than 5% of the population but almost a third of all Earth’s income. Do not wrestle too much with the numbers, reader. I presume you are not some economic historian reconstructing the detailed proportions of this precarious time. Think instead of Vivien Ancelet, studying the chart as a doctor listens to a child’s breath, or views an ultrasound and sees disaster where the others see only blobs. His hands clench, tendons stand erect. If you cannot imagine numbers have such power to move a man, imagine instead one of his historical counterparts: you are the tutor who has sensed something strange about this youth Caligula; you are the native who sees a second set white sails on the horizon following the first; you are the hound who feels the tremors of the tidal wave about to crash on Crete and erase the Minoan people, but you know no one will heed you, even if you bark.

third=last one, starting on page 260, bold is unchanged from the original

[buhrger]

“Causa gravissima debest si Anonymus mendacios vulgat. (The cause must be serious if the Anonymous is publishing lies). Hos quoque ecce. (Look at this too.)” At Caesar’s will the Vice President vanished, replaced by the newest chart, two lists side-by-side, the so-called “Altered list” which we had seen in the Censor’s office, and which we were now to believe was actually the work of hackers, and next to it the new “real list.” But the supposed “altered” list was the real one, I had no doubt—we had worked with it in the Censor’s office. The Anonymous was retro-fibbing, faking interference, pretending his original list had been hacked to make it look like the same mysterious enemies that had targeted Black Sakura had gone after the Anonymous too. There was only one difference between the two lists, Hotaka Andō Mitsubishi, who was much higher on this new supposedly-real list, as if hackers had moved him down on the other but left the rest the same. It was brilliant. The substitution was so plausible, just what an anti-Mitsubishi conspirator might have altered to make it feel like everyone was ranking the Mitsubishi low. This would make it seem as if Andō’s general fall in the lists was faked by a conspiracy rather than a symptom of any real Mitsubishi crisis, and it would draw attention away from poor Black Sakura. He found a way. The Censor’s powers could do nothing, but the Anonymous had found a way.

Re: third=last one, starting on page 260, bold is unchanged from the original

[frobisherw]

There are a few more unchanged bits:

It was brilliant. The substitution was so plausible, just what an anti-Mitsubishi conspirator might have altered to make it feel like everyone was ranking the Mitsubishi low."

“altered” list was the real one, I had no doubt—we had worked with it in the Censor’s office. The Anonymous was retro-fibbing

attention away from poor Black Sakura.

Lost text

[frobisherw]

The material from the original that isn't reproduced in the audio is:

I took my time in thinking, my toes tracing nervous circles on the stone.

swapping in a list that made the Mitsubishi come out better, and, by crying "My list was targeted too!" drawing

Interesting differences

[frobisherw]

The biggest difference that jumps out at me is the inclusion of the word "hackers" and "hacked". Unless I've missed it, the book never uses the word, merely saying "someone had tampered", "someone intercepts", "this tampering", "substitutions", "interference".