To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird. Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1960.

3 children enjoy the quiet fascinations of a Great Depression town in the South, until they’re attacked for being white allies of a black man wrongly accused of rape–in Harper Lee’s classic, momentous, and only novel.

AWARDS
1960 Pulitzer Prize
1960 Brotherhood Award of the National Conference of Christians and Jews
1962 Bestsellers Magazine Paperback of the Year

REVIEW

A slowly unfolding tale with constant revelations about people and life. Scout (the 10-year-old narrator) and Jem are brother and sister, living in the Great Depression south with their widowed father, Atticus, and devoted black maid, Calpurnica. Atticus is an experienced lawyer who agrees to defend Tom Robbins, a black man falsely accused of rape. Many townspeople start to harass Atticus’s family for defending a black person, and soon the kids are embroiled by larger questions of race and justice. Meanwhile, the kids are trying to learn about Boo Radley, an utter recluse whom they have never even heard speak! And in more than one place they find out about the deep dark alleys of addiction.

Leanne, age 16, says:

“It’s beautiful, the way it’s written from the child’s point of view.”

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