Found out my book club's favorite novel was basically corporate marketing

Last week I was prepping discussion notes for our club pick, and I dug into the author's letters and interviews. Turns out the novel we've been praising for 2 years was originally written as a paid promotion for a shipping company in 1923. The romance plot was added later to sell more copies. I found this in a university archive PDF, not even a fancy source. It kind of floored me because we built our whole group identity around that book's 'authentic voice'. Has anyone else discovered their beloved pick had a hidden commercial origin? How did your club handle it?

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