nomadreader

The backstory: When the publication of Go Set a Watchman  was announced, I finally read To Kill a Mockingbird , which I didn't love , but I still hoped to enjoy Go Set a Watchman  more, and I did. The basics: Jean Louise Finch returns to Maycomb from New York City for her annual two-week visit. My thoughts: Going into Go Set a Watchman , I admit I was reading it in multiple ways. I was reading it as though it were a sequel to To Kill a Mockingbird , which it sort of is. I was also reading it as a first draft of To Kill a Mockingbird, which it also sort of it. But both of these readings exist with To Kill a Mockingbird  as a known book. Much as I tried to identify what it would be like to read this novel without having read that book, I couldn't. While I both enjoyed Go Set a Watchman  more and think it's a better book, I'm not sure it would stand on its own as well as it stands next to To Kill a Mockingbird. My issues with To Kill a Mockingbird  were ...

The backstory:   To Kill a Mockingbird  won the Pulitzer Prize in 1961. The basics: Told from the point of view of Scout, a precocious girl in 1930's Maycomb, Alabama, To Kill a Mockingbird  is the story of that town, its views on race and class, and Scout's family. My thoughts: I wanted to love this book, as it is nearly universally loved. I respond strongly to themes of race and class, and yet I failed to connect to this narrative, with a few exceptions. I wrote last week about Calpurnia , who was by far my favorite character in the book. She was fascinating and complex, and I wish there were more of her in the novel. I appreciate that Lee chose to write this novel from the perspective of Scout. At times it helps the reader see things as an outsider, but it also limits the narrative. Admittedly, one of my literary pet peeves are child narrators who are impossibly smart and perceptive, and Lee avoids that quagmire by making Scout consistently her age, but I misse...

I'm hosting the Mockalong this March because I've never read To Kill a Mockingbird . Despite not having read it, however, I felt like I knew so much about it. I had a sense of Scout, I knew Atticus is a lawyer (although I didn't know he is also Scout's dad), and I also knew of Boo Radley. I'm now more than half-way through To Kill a Mockingbird , and I'm perhaps most fascinated by how what I thought I knew about To Kill a Mockingbird  matches up with my actual reading experience. If I were reading this without any knowledge, I don't think the character of Boo Radley would make an impression on me. His importance to the story hasn't been established yet (I presume yet, but I'm quite curious to see where his story ends up.) Perhaps most surprisingly to me as a reader is Calpurnia. She's my favorite character in the novel (by far.) Last week I wrote about Atticus as the moral center of the novel . I don't dislike him, but he thus far lacks a...

As the Mockalong enters its second week, I found myself finishing up Part One of To Kill a Mockingbird. which my Kindle tells me is 40% done. I've been reading quietly the last couple of days, as I haven't had many thoughts about the novel to tweet. Yet as I read I find myself trying to articulate some coherent thoughts about the book so I'm prepared if and when people ask me how my Mockalong reading is going. Minor spoilers about Part One follow. If you haven't read the book, proceed at your own risk. Better yet, buy a copy from Amazon ( Kindle version--only $3.99! ) and read with me! 1. Overall, I don't have a lot of opinions yet. I don't love it. I don't hate it. I wouldn't say I'm underwhelmed, as I'm still not sure I have a sense of what the book is or what it's trying to be. It's fine, but it seems quite ordinary to me so far. It has some nice moments, but as I finished Part One, the two loudest thoughts I had were: 1. I'm...

I have a liteary confession to make: I have never read To Kill a Mockingbird . I know, right? So when news broke last week that Harper Lee has another book coming out this summer , people kept asking me what I thought about it. And they assumed I shared their excitement. (And I sort of do, as the premise of Go Set a Watchman  sounds way  more interesting than the premise of To Kill a Mockingbird .) But I kept *whispering* that I'd never actually read To Kill a Mockingbird . So I'm finally going to read it. Because we now have a pop culture phenomenon and a literary phenomenon at once. And I simply must have an informed opinion. The #Mockalong: I'm pledging to read To Kill a Mockingbird  sometime in March... and I want you to join me . Whether you've read it before or not, read along with me. On Mondays in March, I'll post about the #Mockalong. On Twitter, we can chat about #Mockalong. And we'll all have To Kill a Mockingbird  fresh on our when Go Set a W...