To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Genre:

Classics & Historical Fiction

Publication Date:

May 23, 2006 (first published in 1960)

# of Pages:

324

To Kill a Mockingbird is a fantastic novel. I never got around to reading it in high school, but I am glad that at 24 I finally read it. I feel like I understand this book more now than I would've as a teenager. I guess it may be that I have been through more than I did at that age. I understand more about racism and how things used to be in those days than I did in high school. I guess I didn't really get it back then because I wasn't really exposed to it. I lived in an area where there were mainly minorities and people never argued or fought over race. But once I made it through high school and to college, I got to witness first hand that racism still existed. I guess it takes incidents to happen in reality for you to understand the real-life situations in fiction novels. Without that connection between reality and fiction, you cannot fully connect with a novel in some ways that others might. I know that people who do not fully comprehend racism, may not understand this novel on the same level as someone who does.

To Kill a Mockingbird is told from the POV of Jean Louise Finch, also known as Scout. The story revolves around Scout, her brother Jem, and her father Atticus. When the novel begins we learn the history of the Finches and of Maycomb county where the novel takes place. Scout has just started school and she absolutely hates it. Jem is her older brother and she loves doing things with Jem even though the rest of the family believes she should do more girly things. Their father, Atticus, is a widowed lawyer. Through the story Scout, Jem, and their friend Dill try to get Boo Radley to come out of his house. Boo Radley is Mr. Nathan's brother who lives at the Radley Place. Boo Radley has not been seen outside in a very long time. This is something that Scout, Jem and Dill do not understand. They depict Boo Radley to be scary and his house. But the story really begins when Atticus decides to defend an African American. Most of Maycomb turns on Atticus and it changes the way that Scout and Jem sees the world in which they live. 

This novel was so intriguing. Scout changes tremendously throughout this book, as does her brother Jem. I found the strength and courage of Scout, Jem and Dill to be astonishing. Sometimes I like to think that I am brave, but I do not think that I could have been as brave as them coming to Atticus' rescue that night in front of the jail. I would recommend this book to any and everyone. It is very motivational book to me.

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