Every year, Tolstoy’s War and Peace makes it as one of the top-ten best novels every written. So what does publisher Harper Collins want to do to honor this distinction? Put the 1500 page classic on a diet and change the ending, of course!

That’s right, the new edition coming out this year will be half as long and characters who were previously killed will live and others that lived will die. Why?

Harper Collins says…

the new book was formed by sewing together pieces from Tolstoy’s earlier drafts. That’s right. The very stuff that the author deemed unreadable and should be cut, they’re going to put right back in. The publisher says students of Tolstoy are their main target and are the reason for the new edition.