To Kill a Mockingbird ★★★★★

~ Bookstooge

tokillamockingbird (Custom)This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress, Blogspot & Librarything by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: To Kill a Mockingbird
Series: ———-
Author: Harper Lee
Rating: 5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Classic
Pages: 336
Format: Paperback

 

Synopsis:

Jem and Scout Finch are growing up. Scout has to go to school and while she’s learned to argue with her lawyer father Atticus, some times Dad just puts his foot down. Scout makes friends with a boy her own age named Dill who comes to live with his aunt each summer. Dill wants to see Boo Radley, a mysterious recluse who lives next door to the Finch’s.

Atticus takes on a case where a black man is accused of raping a white woman. Atticus is afraid of how it is going to affect both Jem and Scout as gossip mongers in town are now calling Atticus a nigger lover and that attitude trickles down to the children. Atticus make hash of the prosecutors case but the jury isn’t swayed and convict the man to death. While in prison awaiting appeal he tries to escape (his right arm is withered and of no use) and is gunned down by the guards. The father of the woman making the accusations realizes how Atticus destroyed his story and vows revenge on him even though he won the case.

Jem and Scout are returning home one night from the Halloween party at school when they are attacked by an unknown assailant. Jem’s arm is broken and he’s knocked on the head. The assailant begins to try to choke Scout to death but due to her costume (a ham made from chicken wire and paper mache) is foiled. The assailant is in turn assailed by a mysterious rescuer and this person takes an unconscious Jem home. Turns out the assailant was the father who swore vengeance on Atticus. The rescuer? Boo Radley, a sickly albino.

The book ends with the Sheriff telling Atticus that the vengeance swearer fell on his own knife and that nobody, especially not Boo Radley, stabbed him to protect the children.

 

My Thoughts:

My goodness. What a great book. A story told by an adult remembering everything through the eyes of a 7-9 year old girl.

While everyone always focuses on the case with the black man and that Boo Radley is real and saves Scout, to Scout, who is telling the story, they aren’t any more important than the day at school when the teacher smacked her hand because she explained how some of the kids thought. This is a book about growing up and not realizing it until years later.

I don’t know exactly what to say here. I am glad that books like this are still read in schools. Maybe being older has given me an appreciation for just what Lee did here? I found the idea of “Scout” telling the story to be perfect. The occasional interjections by her as her older self simply brought out what she missed as a child. At the same time, I never felt hit over the head by Lee writing ham-handedly or TRYING to “make a point”. She makes her points very casually and lets it be up to the reader just how much they actually want to “get”.

I know I saw the movie several times during middleschool and highschool but I can’t remember if I ever actually read this before. I am glad I did read this now and I look forward to a re-read in 10’ish years.

This is a well written, engaging book that you can read for pure enjoyment if you so desire or you can read it as a classic tale of growing up in the South or you can read it as an activist and use it to bash people over the head with your SJW ideals. In this regards Lee is like a firearms manufacturer. She lets you, the user, decide just how to use this book.

As it should be.

★★★★★

 

bookstooge (Custom)

 

34 thoughts on “To Kill a Mockingbird ★★★★★”

    1. I’m just concerned about it lasting now that the heirs of Lee are in charge and raised the price they would charge for schools to use it. I don’t have a link off the top of my head, but it was all mixed in with her post-humuous book “Go set a watchman”.

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  3. I absolutely loved this book. I think you may have read it when you were younger–it’s one of those books which are read in middle school. I feel like I need to reread it. Are you going to have a go at the sequel?

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    1. I will not be reading the sequel. Lee never published it and it was only after her death that her moneygrubbing heirs released it. That doesn’t speak very well to me. Also, most of the reviews I read of it were of the “I wish I could un-read this” kind.

      I think I’m going to stick with this book from Lee and call that good enough.

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      1. Actually, it was published before her death, but there’s good reason to doubt how much consent she had in its publication.

        But, yeah, avoid it. Wish I had.

        This one, however, is probably my favorite novel ever. Have a line from it tattooed on my arm.

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        1. Thanks for the info.

          I just went and read your review of it. It definitely wasn’t one that I remember putting me off the book. Of course, I’d have to track your review down on booklikes and that seems a bit too much like work 😉

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      2. Yeah, I tried reading it but it was so damn boring—I couldn’t even get through the first chapter! The sequel was actually her original draft for the book but she changed everything, thank goodness!

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  4. I seem to be in the minority for this one, but I was very indifferent to this book. I think it may be in part because I read it as an adult without having any kind of interaction with it when I was younger — I have not read the book before this, nor have I ever seen the movie. I’m glad a lot of people love this book (I’m all for making people fans of reading even if I don’t like the book that is their particular gateway into books) but it’s not my cup of tea.

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    1. For me, the big thing of having it be read in highschools is the quality of the writing. Students need to be shown just what good writing is. If they can take away that one thing, then once they go do their own thing, that’ll always be in the back of their minds.
      Hopefully 🙂

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      1. English was my second language and i tried to like it. The thing is, the school i went to (boys agricultural…) the kids dint give two shits about english so it was difficult to concentrate… i was already writing poetry at the time tho, so the story to me is one i will always remember as putting my teacher in tears. There was also a Calpurnia in the book yes? So everytime i see or read that name, i think back to TKAM…

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  9. I’m so glad you liked this!! This is a personal favourite for me!! I loved how this explored the topic of growing up- the use of a child’s voice was so effectively done and it really showed how much she grew throughout the story.
    On the point about this still being read in schools- it’s very frustrating but it was taken off the UK syllabus because they wanted to move away from US authors (which makes me want to tear my hair out). But yeah I’m glad people are still reading this book.

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    1. I could understand moving away from it if they had an option that was just as good and just as approachable. Casting no aspersions, I rather doubt it though :-/

      I look forward to a re-read already 😀

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  10. I’m glad you enjoyed it! This is hands down my favourite classic 🙂 I am sad I never read it at school. Would have loved to!

    I only picked it up about 4 years ago.

    Will for sure read it again in a couple of years!

    The sequel? Probably not.

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  12. An all-time for myself too. Read it last year or so, and it really caught me off guard a couple of times. The court scene, the finale scene, every scene!

    Now, the real question is if you’ll be reading the controversial “sequel”. I’ve been hesitant to read it although I have the book. I’m just scared it’ll tarnish my view on this classic here…

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