Truly reading the book

I completely agree with David Malouf on how the author can never truly “read” their story. I’ve actually thought of this before now. basically, as the author is the one who put all the work into creating it in the first place, only they would know every possible plot descision or way of writing it that could’ve been made. It’s just like what i think was what Sunil or Tony Birch said, as if the author looks into their books, they will find stuff in it that they think they shouldn’t have put in, as the story to them was always a mass of ideas floating around their head, so there’s stuff floating in their head that was in the same mind as the story. However, regarding the reader, the story is a completely finished product. They will never know what could’ve been, it’s just there for them on the page to read. So whilst the author will always see the story as incomplete, it is complete to the reader and only they can only truly appreciate it as a story.