YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND ME - MISSING PAGES.
If I had to summarise what You Don’t Understand Me is about, I would say it is about understanding and coping with your feelings in a world that constantly pushes you to be ‘perfect’. I had my own challenge with this after the book was published. Some keen-eyed readers noticed a mistake: a problem at the typesetting stage meant that four pages in the ‘Friends’ chapter had been left out, although their headings still showed up in the contents page.
This was so disappointing to me, after two years of hard work, that thousands of copies of my book had been sold with a mistake in them. My book wasn’t perfect. I felt gutted, and for a few hours I couldn’t let go of that feeling. But then I had a little word with myself. I had to remind myself, that nothing is perfect. Mistakes get made. Life is up and down.
The publishers have reprinted, and these books will be winging their way to the shops soon. But of course, the book still won’t be perfect, because perfect doesn’t exist. I am sure there will be mistakes that I have made in the book, perhaps things that I have said based on the evidence I had, which will turn out not to be true. And there are plenty of things in it which are a matter of opinion, and you might disagree with. So always, better done than perfect.
I apologise on behalf of my publishers for those of you who bought the first edition with a mistake. I hope that in time these will turn out to be the rare, valuable types of first edition! In the meantime, we publish the missing pages here. If you want any further information, please do contact my publishers via justine.taylor@bonnierbooks.co.uk.
Tara Porter 15th May 2022