History WhatCouldHaveBeen / Literature

* DavidWeber had originally planned to kill off the eponymous ''HonorHarrington'' at the end of ''At All Costs'', and time skip ahead a few decades so that her children could deal with the Mesan Alignment. Plans changed because of a combination of fan outcry and the author of the side-series pushing the timeline forward faster than Weber had originally planned.

--> In an earlier version, I imagined something called ''lij'' time, which moves much faster or much slower than ordinary time. I had Olus become a ''lijok,'' --> a god who can control ''lij'' time. He puts himself and Kezi into fast ''lij'' time so that they can be together for many years before her sacrifice.

** There are '''far''' too many of these to mention in the new ''History of Middle-earth'' series. Perhaps the most radical are that Tol Eressëa was going to be England, Farmer Maggot and Treebeard were going to be villains, and Aragorn was going to be a {{badass}} hobbit called Peregrin Boffin (alias "Trotter") who had been tortured in Mordor, or else a FutureBadass version of Bilbo himself. Either version would have had [[ArtificialLimbs wooden feet]] as a result of his real feet having been ''[[JackBauerInterrogationTechnique sawn off by his tormentors]]''.

** ''Through The Looking Glass'' had a chapter called "The Wasp In The Wig", shelved because Tenniel claimed it was impossible to draw.
** Instead of the Caucus Race being used to dry off Alice and the animals, the Dodo would have lead them all to a nearby cottage he knew of, where they could dry off. As they walked, the Dodo, the Eaglet, the Lory, and Alice all outwalked the others, so they went ahead while leaving the duck to lead the rest. This was based off of a real event that happened on the outing when Carroll first told Alice the story. As they were finishing their boating, it burst out raining and Carroll lead them to a cottage he knew was nearby, where they could dry off. He and the Liddel. sisters (Alice, Edith, and L.C.) walked faster than the rest, so they left Canon Duckworth, a member of the group, to lead everyone else there. Carroll eventually used the Caucus Race instead, because he felt that the event he was basing the cottage story off of was too obscure and would only be funny to the circle of people who had been involved.

* ''{{Twilight}}'' was originally only going to have one sequel called ''Forever Dawn''. The basic storyline is the same as what would become the fourth book, ''Breaking Dawn''. Edward and Bella [[spoiler: get married, she gets pregnant on the honeymoon, and Bella has to be turned into a vampire to survive the birth of their daughter Renesmee. Jacob isn't present at the birth, but he imprints on Renesmee a few weeks later]]. The biggest change is that the love triangle of Bella, Edward, and Jacob never develops because the events of ''New Moon'' and ''Eclipse'' never happen. In short, Edward never leaves and Bella and Jacob don't become close. The lack of the two middle books also leaves Victoria and Laurent alive. Laurent does a HeelFaceTurn and Victoria gets one of her minions to tell [[TheMafia the Volturi]] about [[spoiler: Renesmee]]. Victoria is later the only one killed at the final standoff, courtesy of the mostly-unnamed werewolves. The ending is still pretty much the same HappilyEverAfter as it is in the final version.

* For a while, JRRTolkien was planning on naming the protagonist of ''{{The Lord of the Rings}}'' Bingo, son of Bilbo Baggins. Frodo Took might have been the name of one of his companions.

** There are '''far''' too many of these to mention in the new ''History of Middle-earth'' series. Perhaps the most radical are that Tol Eressëa was going to be England, Farmer Maggot and Treebeard were going to be villains, and Aragorn was going to be a {{badass}} hobbit called Peregrin Boffin who had been tortured in Mordor, or else a FutureBadass version of Bilbo himself. Either version would have had [[ArtificialLimbs wooden feet]] as a result of his real feet having been ''[[JackBauerInterrogationTechnique sawn off by his tormentors]]''.
*** Teleporno? Boffin? It sounds like the [[{{bowdlerise}} uncensored original]].
**** To be fair, poor Celeborn's (along with many other Elves') name is usually separated into the wrong syllables: it's Celeb-orn/Telep-orno. Same with his daughter Celebrían, which is not about brains, but Celeb-rían "silver queen". Oh, and the "C" in both names is pronounced like a "K". And Tolkien switched names a lot during the early stages of writing [=LotR=], so almost all characters in the Fellowship went through multiple names.

* And let's not forget that Tolkien originally planned to give Aragorn's alias not as Strider, but as Trotter. A great missed opportunity if ever there was one.

* Bram Stoker's notes for ''Literature/{{Dracula}}'' show that Dracula's castle originally became a CollapsingLair when [[LoadBearingBoss the Count was killed]].

** ''Magical Beasts And Where To Find Them'' introduced the idea of a "Lethifold", basically a murderous living blanket that would smother its victim and could only be defeated by using a Patronus (making it an obvious foe for Harry, since that's one of his best spells). This was revealed during the long wait for the latter books, and many people expected the Lethifold would show up, but in the end it never did.

** Also, there was gonna be a book telling the story from Edward's viewpoint, but it was scrapped after details were leaked on the internet.

* ''ThePrincessBride'' epilogue mentions a sequel called ''Buttercup's Baby'' that was having trouble getting published due to "legal issues with S. Morgenstern's(an alias of the real author William Goldman) estate." It was meant to be fake, but a sample chapter does exist which readers could get if they wrote in to the address enclosed in the book. Later editions simply published the sample chapter, and people began clamoring for the full sequel. Goldman never expected ''ThePrincessBride'' to be so popular, so he hadn't written anything beyond the sample. He has stated that he wants to write the full book, but [[DevelopmentHell he's having trouble coming up with ideas for it]]

* ''{{Twilight}}'' was originally only going to have one sequel called ''Forever Dawn''. The basic storyline is the same as what would become the fourth book, ''Breaking Dawn''. Edward and Bella [[spoiler: get married, she gets pregnant on the honeymoon, and Bella has to be turned into a vampire to survive the birth of their daughter Renesmee. Jacob isn't present at the birth, but he imprints on Renesmee a few weeks later]]. The biggest change is that the love triangle of Bella, Edward, and Jacob never develops because the events of ''New Moon'' and ''Eclipse'' never happen. In short, Edward never leaves and Bella and Jacob don't become close. The lack of the two middle books also leaves Victoria and Laurent alive. Laurent does a HeelFaceTurn and Victoria gets one of her minions to tell [[TheMafia the Volturi]] about [[spoiler: Renesmee]]. Victoria is later the only one killed at the final standoff, courtesy of the werewolves, who are mostly a band of no-names. The ending is still pretty much the same HappilyEverAfter as it is in the final version.

* ''{{Twilight}}'' was originally only going to have one sequel called ''Forever Dawn''. The basic storyline is the same as what would become the fourth book, ''Breaking Dawn''. Edward and Bella [[spoiler: get married, she gets pregnant on the honeymoon, and Bella has to be turned into a vampire to survive the birth of their daughter Renesmee. Jacob isn't present at the birth, but he imprints on Renesmee a few weeks later]]. The biggest change is that the love triangle of Bella, Edward, and Jacob never develops because the events of ''New Moon'' and ''Eclipse'' never happen. In short, Edward never leaves and Bella and Jacob don't become close. Victoria and Laurent are still alive. Laurent does a HeelFaceTurn and Victoria gets one of her minions to tell [[TheMafia the Volturi]] about [[spoiler: Renesmee]]. Victoria is later the only one killed at the final standoff, courtesy of the werewolves, who are mostly a band of no-names. The ending is still pretty much the same HappilyEverAfter as it is in the final version.

* ''{{Twilight}}'' was originally only going to have one sequel called ''Forever Dawn''. The basic storyline is the same as what would become the fourth book, ''Breaking Dawn''. Edward and Bella [[spoiler: get married, she gets pregnant on the honeymoon, and Bella has to be turned into a vampire to survive the birth of their daughter Renesmee]]. The biggest change is that the love triangle of Bella, Edward, and Jacob never develops because the events of ''New Moon'' and ''Eclipse'' never happen, meaning Edward never leaves and Bella and Jacob don't become close. (In fact, Jacob ended up having a not very important death in this version, though he still found time to [[spoiler: imprint on Renesmee]]) Victoria and Laurent are still alive. Laurent does a HeelFaceTurn and Victoria tells [[TheMafia the Volturi]] about [[spoiler: Renesmee]]. Victoria is later the only one killed at the final standoff, courtesy of the werewolves, who are a band of no-names. The ending is still pretty much the same HappilyEverAfter as it is in the final version.

** ''Through tThe Looking Glass'' had a chapter called "The Wasp In The Wig", shelved because Tenniel claimed it was impossible to draw.