To Kill a Mockingbird
 | By Harper Lee Grand Central Publishing, 1988, Mass Market Paperback Customer Rating: 1764 reviews Recommend |
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The unforgettable novel of a childhood in a sleepy Southern town and the crisis of conscience that rocked it, To Kill A Mockingbird became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film, also a classic.
Compassionate, dramatic, and deeply moving, To Kill A Mockingbird takes readers to the roots of human behavior - to innocence and experience, kindness and cruelty, love and hatred, humor and pathos. Now with over 18 million copies in print and translated into forty languages, this regional story by a young Alabama woman claims universal appeal. Harper Lee always considered her book to be a simple love story. Today it is regarded as a masterpiece of American literature.
"When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow.... When enough years had gone by to enable us to look back on them, we sometimes discussed the events leading to his accident. I maintain that the Ewells started it all, but Jem, who was four years my senior, said it started long before that. He said it began the summer Dill came to us, when Dill first gave us the idea of making Boo Radley come out."
Set in the small Southern town of Maycomb, Alabama, during the Depression, To Kill a Mockingbird follows three years in the life of 8-year-old Scout Finch, her brother, Jem, and their father, Atticus — three years punctuated by the arrest and eventual trial of a young black man accused of raping a white woman. Though her story explores big themes, Harper Lee chooses to tell it through the eyes of a child. The result is a tough and tender novel of race, class, justice, and the pain of growing up.
Like the slow-moving occupants of her fictional town, Lee takes her time getting to the heart of her tale; we first meet the Finches the summer before Scout's first year at school. She, her brother, and Dill Harris, a boy who spends the summers with his aunt in Maycomb, while away the hours reenacting scenes from Dracula and plotting ways to get a peek at the town bogeyman, Boo Radley. At first the circumstances surrounding the alleged rape of Mayella Ewell, the daughter of a drunk and violent white farmer, barely penetrate the children's consciousness. Then Atticus is called on to defend the accused, Tom Robinson, and soon Scout and Jem find themselves caught up in events beyond their understanding. During the trial, the town exhibits its ugly side, but Lee offers plenty of counterbalance as well — in the struggle of an elderly woman to overcome her morphine habit before she dies; in the heroism of Atticus Finch, standing up for what he knows is right; and finally in Scout's hard-won understanding that most people are essentially kind "when you really see them." By turns funny, wise, and heartbreaking, To Kill a Mockingbird is one classic that continues to speak to new generations, and deserves to be reread often. — Alix Wilber
Title: To Kill a Mockingbird
Sales Rank: 1271 in Books
Author: Harper Lee
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing, 1988-10-11, Mass Market Paperback, 281 pages, ISBN: 0446310786
Package Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.1 x 1.1 inches, 0.35 pounds
- So very boring
- The only reason this book deserves one star is that something interesting actually happened,albeit AT THE END OF THE FRIGGIN' BOOK!
I swear watching Teletubbies or mold grow in your shower is more interesting than this book.I could not get through half of it.
Nothing even goes on until the very end.By then though,you have given… More reviews
- Race and Class in the Deep South
- It is perhaps appropriate that this was the first book I read after the election of America's first black President. My real reason for re-reading it, however, was for the purposes of comparison with Faulkner's "Intruder in the Dust", which deals with a similar theme. Indeed, I recently came across an allegation that Harper Lee's novel was essentially a plagiarism of Faulkner's.… More reviews
- There is a reason this book will be read for centuries and centuries...
- ... mainly because it is such a good story and so well written. Come to think of it, not much of this book is really about the rape and crime. It is about childhood, growing up and growing prejudice. It is about not only racism but also feminism. Scout, the main character, has such a lovely personality and I really started to like her. It was almost… More reviews
- Excelent Book!
- I've always heard really good things about the book, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. The first time I tried to read it I had to put it down because I got really confused at the beginning. However, I tried it again later on and I realized what a good book I had put down. For me it was still a little confusing at the beginning because the setting and… More reviews
- Tequila Mockingbird
- Funny thing when my daughter requested this book she kept saying Tequila Mockingbird. Other than that, we received this on time and everything was great, it looks brand new and it was here when she needed it. Actually a week before.… More reviews
