Before there was Netflix (I know, I’m old, haha), I used to binge-watch a lot of TV series and would have to wait eagerly for the DVD boxes to come out. Two elements were always my favorite: the blooper reel and the deleted scenes. The first was laugh-out-loud funny, of course, but the second was even cooler. It offered even more of my favorite characters…
Then, and I still don’t know what changed it, I slowly started feeling differently about deleted scenes. I came to realize that there’s a reason they’re deleted. Sometimes, it was because network shows run on a tight time frame and they were just too long. But other times, I found myself watching them and agreeing that it was for the better they’d been deleted. As much as I love the Lord of the Rings, for example, the extended version is really, reallllllly long.
In book box sets, I loved deleted scenes as well. Again, why wouldn’t I, when they offered more of the characters I loved so much? But here, the same thing happened. I would read them and then agree that yes, they didn’t belong in the book. Only rarely did I feel a deleted scene should’ve been included in the original book. I still love them, don’t get me wrong, but I could almost always see why they weren’t included.
I only have one box set with deleted scenes, the No Shame box set. My other box sets only have bonus materials in the form of extra chapters (for example in the Irresistible Omegas box sets) or sometimes even a whole novella (like in my Ignite box set). Part of that is because I don’t often have deleted scenes anymore. The No Shame series was my first series, so I’ve learned a lot since then and my writing process has become more efficient. I usually detect much earlier when a scene isn’t working so I can still change course.
But even when I released the box set for my No Shame series, I debated long before including some deleted scenes. In the end, I decided to put them in. Funny enough, the most important reason was because I felt they don’t belong in the original. Well, some of them. Two of the deleted scenes were taken out because I decided to start the fourth book, No Shame, at a different point in the timeline. But I’d already written two scenes when I realized it didn’t work, so those offer truly a behind the scenes view that doesn’t change the original story.
The other two, I still feel I was right to take them out. Don’t get me wrong, they’re both hella sexy and I did use some paragraphs of them later on, but they didn’t really fit the vision for the series.
So why did I decide to include them? Maybe because some readers will feel differently about deleted scenes and will love the extra time with their favorite characters. And maybe because I wanted to show that there are reasons why authors take whole scenes out, even when they’ve spent hours crafting them. It hurts to “throw away” words like that, but there’s usually a good reason.
But now I’m curious how you feel about deleted scenes: yay or nay? Do you love them, hate them, or couldn’t care less?
I enjoy deleted scenes. When it’s in a movie I like when the director comments why it was deleted. Sometimes it’s because it was redundant, sometimes it didn’t fit the mood. Most often, it was for time, because the movie was running too long. Many times, I felt the cut portion gave some additional insight into a character. With your books, I really liked the deleted parts. I enjoyed the thought process. But I’d be OK not knowing what was cut or changed as well. Just keep doing what you do.
I love deleted scenes.. they make me want to read the book more than twice 🤭🤭
Yay on deleted scenes! For me, any extra time with characters I love is always a good thing.
I love deleted scenes because sometimes they give a different view of the background. You also imagine how they fit into the actual scene. I am very much for it.
sell the extras separately so if you already purchased the series, you can get these too. I really like that idea.
I despise deleted scenes and never read/ watch them. For me, they destroy the cannon and ruin the entire experience. Fiction relies on a creator’s ability to get the audience to suspend disbelief and feel like the characters and stories are real. Deleted scenes (and blooper reels) completely ruin all that work.
I enjoy deleted scenes very much. I normally read them when the author refers to them at the end of a book.
Deleted scenes at the end of a book can be a lot of fun to read. And when they’re at the end, each person can choose to read them or skip them. I’ve enjoyed the short, additional scenes and bloopers that are included at the end of some movies. Yes, I’ve now been sucked into staying through the credits just to see if any have been included. It’s worth it; they’re fun!
I enjoy reading deleted scenes. Sometimes it adds a little extra to the story. And sometimes one thinks no wonder it was deleted. It is just an added bonus to the story. Thanks
I enjoy reading deleted scenes very much.
I agree that there was a reason deleted scenes were deleted. I feel guilty for not reading them, but they’re not my cup of tea.
I love deleted scenes, they’re part of the process. I’m sure we all have scenes in our lives that we’d love to delete. I like a HEA just as much as the next guy but I’m more interested in how we got there. It’s not just about the characters but the author too. Nobody sits down and writes the perfect story beginning to end. If I love the book, if I’ve read it a thousand times, chances are I’ve deconstructed it at least half of those times and I wonder about the road not taken. Deleted scenes feed that curiousity. Does that make any sense?
I generally enjoy reading deleted scenes because, in addition to spending more time with the characters, it also gives a glimpse to the author’s thought processes and story development. Honestly it depends on the book/characters/author whether I’m interested enough to read them. If they’re just an excuse for more sex, I’ll skip it, thanks. But if the scenes focus more on character and/or relationship development (even if that does include sex), I’ll gobble it up. Yeah, yeah, I’m one of those that generally skips the sex scenes because….gross. Don’t judge me! I’m all about the character and relationship development (people are fascinating, even if they are fictional) and I understand that includes physical expressions of emotion, I Just don’t care to read much about that part. I also really enjoy the underlying plot lines: how these two (or more) came together, what keeps them together and will there be explosions?? And, Nora, you do all that SO well. So, whether or not you offer deleted scenes, I’ll keep reading your books!
I adore deleted/extended scenes. With movies, I consider them part of the “you didn’t get to see this because it messed up the pace” but it’s a perfectly valid part of the movie. With books, they’re never the parts that got tossed out of the books… it’s always little vignettes of behind the scene action. I like the peeks behind the stories. I almost never want to let my book families to go… so reading the extra scenes means I get to spend some extra time with them. And I love that!