"The scriptwriter had set it up that way for that purpose so she could go off and have some feminine companionship and a little bit of perspective on these smelly men," Gabaldon says. "I said, I see what you're trying to do here, and it would work if this was 1935 London, but it's not going to work in 18th century Highlands. No villages, no cobbled streets, no stores, no houses with windows, to start with. People still thought it was a sin to play cards. They wouldn't have had any cards, they wouldn't have had any tea, and women would not have had the leisure to be socializing in the afternoon."

Gabaldon gave the writer a list of things the highlander women would have been doing, and they ended up filming the scene in a Highland museum, using actual equipment and taking advantage of professional reenactors who already knew the songs the women were singing.

That scene ended up being so effective that it feels like it came straight out of the book, but even if it didn't, Gabaldon isn't at all worried about the show being an exact representation of the book.

"I tell people the book is the book and the show is the show, and you're going to enjoy both of them immensely, but not if you sit in front of the show with the book in your hand going, wait, wait, you left that out!"

For the record, the series will be jumping ahead to those scenes that did not occur in the premiere, but not until much later in the season. Hopefully, the wait will make the payoff that much more satisfying.

Outlander airs Saturdays at 9 p.m. on Starz.