If we take literally the claim that every traversal of the database determines a different story, a reader who encounters three segments in the order "A" then "B" then "C" will construct a different story than a reader who encounters the same segments in the order "B" then "A" then "C." It is only if sequence plays a crucial role in determining meaning that hypertext can be viewed as an Aleph that contains potentially a large number of different stories. If the reader could place the information given by each lexia wherever she wanted in a developing narrative pattern, it would not matter in which order she encounters the lexia themselves. This emphasis on the meaningfulness of sequence hits however a serious logical obstacle. Textual fragments are like the pieces of a jig-saw puzzle; some fit easily together, and some others do not because of their intrinsic shape, or narrative content.

Marie-Laure Ryan, Beyond Myth and Metaphor - The Case of Narrative in Digital Media

Ryan is comparing Hypertext fiction to the notion of Borges' Aleph. Although this is not what the early Hypertext theorists based their ideas on, the concept is similar. A Hypertext novel according to Landow produces a new meaning each time you read a hypertext fiction due to the lack of linearity. A linear reading of a story A, B, C will give one story, then the reader will gain a different perspective and meaning reading in the order of B, C, A. Ryan states that this is only possible if sequence plays a major role in the determination of a meaning that results in a coherent novel.

Ryan states that “It is simply not possible to construct a coherent story out of every permutation of a set of textual fragment, because fragments are implicitly ordered by relations of a logical presupposition, material causality and temporal sequence”. She goes on to say that you could come across the death of a character in one segment and then come across the same character alive in the next segment you elect to read. The reader could argue this is the case in the Hypertext novel Victory Garden with the death of one of the main characters - Emily. You read about her death in one node and in another read about people thinking of her as if she is alive, in the present.

Ryan believes that the reading of a hypertext novel is “narrative equivalent” of a jigsaw puzzle, and rather than beginning a new story each time the reader opens the novel, a picture is built up over many readings that does not change, but is added to.