Changes In Stephen King's The Stand 1978-1990 Part 6

In the 1990 edition of The Stand, Chapter 8 gets expanded at the end and the reader gets a few more paragraphs detailing how the flu spreads across the country.  Chapter 9 gets a few more details about Larry Underwood's one night stand with the oral hygienist, and Larry's mom buys him a Sara Lee cheesecake with strawberries in addition to all the things she bought him in the earlier edition.  That last addition is odd, but I haven't heard that Stephen King received any sort of product placement money for the novel, so it's probably just a minor detail meant to add to the realistic feel of the novel (well, as realistic as an apocalyptic novel gets anyway) that got cut when the original manuscript got edited.

More major changes happen in Chapters 11 and 12, which aren't the 11 and 12 in the earlier edition.  The 1990 edition has 78 chapters whereas the earlier version has only 68, so, in addition to the various other changes, King adds ten new chapters to the book.

Chapter 11, the first of those new chapters, involves Larry visiting his mother at her workplace, where she lectures him about how selfish he is and then gives him money to go see a movie until she's done working.  He goes and sees one of the Nightmare On Elm Street movies.  Chapter 12 involves Frannie Goldsmith fighting with her mother over Frannie's pregnancy.  Both chapters certainly aren't essential for the plot, but are nice ways for King to develop the characters a bit more, especially for Larry's guilt complex and Frannie's concerns about motherhood.  Interestingly enough, both chapters involve the protagonists having conflicts with their mothers.

Chapter 13 returns to one of the chapters in the earlier edition, where Stu Redman gets some answers about his quarantine.  I'll pick up there tomorrow.