I'm writing a book and want every chapter to start on an odd page. Word has an option to start a new section on an odd page, and when that works, it works great, does everything I want: no matter if I add a bunch of sentences to a chapter or remove paragraphs, I can be sure that the next chapter will always start on an odd page--be facing the reader when he opens to a new chapter.


But after I've done a few chapters like that and I go back to reread for errors, I find that the Section Changes to Odd Page have often changed to just New Page and that might be an Even Page. If I change it back to an Odd Page, there is no guarantee that it will stick. Sometimes it does, sometimes not. Everything is formatted exactly in every chapter, and I have no idea why Word does this (from Word2007 to Word2013). I thought maybe if the previous chapter ended on an even page, Word would figure out that the next page would be an odd page and would change my option to just "Next Page."
Why does Word change my section preferences? How can I keep my options intact?

This shouldn't happen but I have seen documents of my own do this in the past. I can't remember if there is a fix.

It may be related to the dropcap issue in your other thread. The section break might be getting tangled up with the object anchor of your dropcaps.

You could always create a macro to force all sections onto odd pages and run this anytime you notice the problem.

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Andrew Lockton
Chrysalis Design, Melbourne Australia

I actually had the problem in two different books, and one of them does not use dropped caps.