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To Kill a Mockingbird: The 40th Anniversary Edition of the Pulitzer Prize-Winning Novel

by Harper Lee

To Kill a Mockingbird: The 40th Anniversary Edition of the Pulitzer Prize-Winning Novel Cover

Awards

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize

Staff Pick

We didn't read this in high school. The assigned book was The Scarlet Letter, which was already a favorite of mine. Recently, however, I decided that I'd ignored To Kill a Mockingbird for too long. If you haven't read it, or if it's been awhile since you last played with Scout, Jem, and Dill, then I urge you to tag along. I read it slowly, as I knew I'd never read it again for the first time. There are no big operatic moments and yet I found myself weeping several times. Its power lies just beneath its deceptively simple sentences. It may be an almost-perfect book.
Recommended by Christopher, Powell's City of Books

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

"Shoot all the bluejays you want,
if you can hit 'em,
but remember it's a sin
to kill a mockingbird."

To Kill a Mockingbird is the story of the early childhood of Jean Louise "Scout" Finch, chronicling the humorous trials and tribulations of growing up in Maycomb, Alabama, from 1933 to 1935. Maycomb's small-town Southern atmosphere — in which nobody locks their doors at night and the local telephone operator can identify callers solely by their voices — contributes to the security of Scout's world, just as pervasive forces of racism threaten to unsettle it. Scout's devotion to her older brother, Jem, and her hero-worship of her father, the defense attorney Atticus Finch, infuse this story with an uncommon intimacy and affection.

An acknowledged tomboy, Scout — along with her ubiquitous playmates Jem and Dill — spends her days lamenting that she must attend school and her afternoons engaged in various schemes to provoke a mysterious neighbor, Boo Radley, to emerge from his house. As Scout, Jem, and Dill become increasingly obsessed with luring Boo outside, they put themselves at greater risk, at one point incurring Boo's brother's gunfire.

Scout and Jem's misadventures suggest an idyllic childhood, one tempered only by the rules of their beloved servant, Calpurnia; the standards imposed on them by their prudish Aunt Alexandra; and the particularities of their neighbors, Miss Maudie Atkinson and Mrs. Dubose. Over the course of the novel, both children learn to appreciate the values held by their father, whose boyhood nickname, "Ol' One-Shot," is put to the test in an episode with a mad dog.

When Atticus is assigned a case defending a local black man, Tom Robinson, who has been unjustly accused of rape by Mayella Ewell, a poor white woman from a family of ill-repute, Scout explores her beliefs, her father's moral obligations, and the dynamics of her community. As the untroubled realm of her childhood collides with the adult world of the courthouse, Scout discovers that redemption — salvation, even — can come from unexpected sources.

From Our Staff:

If you're going to write only one novel, this is the novel to write! To say that To Kill a Mockingbird is one of the great American novels doesn't do it justice. If you've never read it, read it. If you read it in high school, read it again! I guarantee that what you take from it as an adult will be even better and more meaningful than what you took from it the first time around. Brilliant!
Recommended by our staff at Powells.com

Synopsis:

"Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."

A lawyer's advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee's classic novel--a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with rich humor and unswerving honesty the irrationality of adult attitudes toward race and class in the Deep South of the 1930s. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence, and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina and quiet heroism of one man's struggle for justice--but the weight of history will only tolerate so much.

One of the best-loved classics of all time, To Kill a Mockingbird has earned many distinctions since its original publication in 1960. It has won the Pulitzer Prize, been translated into more than forty languages, sold more than thirty million copies worldwide, and been made into an enormously popular movie. Most recent, librarians across the country gave the book the highest of honors by voting it the best novel of the century (Library Journal).

HarperCollins is proud to celebrate the anniversary of the book's publication with this special hardcover edition.

Synopsis:

A specially packaged, popularly priced hardcover edition of the American classic commemorates the 40th anniversary of its original publication. "That rare literary phenomenon, a Southern novel with no mildew on its magnolia leaves."--"Vogue."

About the Author

Harper Lee was born in 1926 in Monroeville, Alabama. She attended the local schools and studied law at the University of Alabama. For some years she spent most of her time in New York City, where, until she began writing, she was employed in the reservations department of an international airline. "Aside from writing," says Miss Lee, "my chief interests in life are collecting memoirs of nineteenth-century clergymen, golf, crime and music."

What Our Readers Are Saying

Add a comment for a chance to win!
Average customer rating based on 4 comments:
Dill, August 16, 2009 (view all comments by Dill)
"To Kill a Mockingbird" is not a book that should need to be 'taught' in school. It should just be read and absorbed. I can't believe there is a thinking American out there who has not read it.

The story of a black man facing a lynch mob harks back to Faulkner's "Intruder in the Dust", but 'Mockingbird' stands on it's own.

"To Kill a Mockingbird" is timeless and borderless. Anyone who reads the news knows that atrocities like this still happen in other countries.
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D.B. Pacini, July 10, 2009 (view all comments by D.B. Pacini)
A FAVORITE:

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee is one of my favorite American fiction classics. I urge you to add it to your "must read" list if you've not read it. Read Wikipedia's listing. They state that British librarians ranked TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD ahead of the Bible as one every adult should read before they die.

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(1 of 1 readers found this comment helpful)
desi_young, November 4, 2008 (view all comments by desi_young)
Classic. Read the book or watch the movie or listen on audiobook. I reccomend any version of this timeless story. If reading for the first time get the paperback, if like the countless others who love this book, go out and buy this copy with the pretty hardcover.
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(3 of 5 readers found this comment helpful)
View all 4 comments

Product Details

ISBN:
9780060194994
Author:
Lee, Harper
Publisher:
HarperCollins Publishers
Author:
by Harper Lee
Location:
New York, NY :
Subject:
General
Subject:
Classics
Subject:
Girls
Subject:
Race relations
Subject:
Southern states
Subject:
Fathers and daughters
Subject:
Trials
Subject:
Legal stories
Subject:
Domestic fiction
Subject:
Bildungsromane.
Subject:
Bildungsromans
Edition Number:
40
Edition Description:
40th anniversary ed.
Large Print:
Yes
Series Volume:
106-419
Publication Date:
December 1999
Binding:
Hardcover
Grade Level:
General/trade
Language:
English
Pages:
336
Dimensions:
8.24x5.65x1.13 in. .97 lbs.

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