GO SET a WATCHMAN (audiobook) by Harper Lee

Published in 2015 by HarperAudio in 2015
Read by Reese Witherspoon.
Duration: 6 hours, 57 minutes
Unabridged

I waited for a while to take a chance with Go Set a Watchman. The blowback when it was released was formidable, so I decided to let it sit for a while and in the meantime stop reading the reviews.

Warning: spoilers ahead.

This book is set about 20 years after the events of To Kill a Mockingbird, in the 1950s. Jean Louise Finch (Scout) has come home to Maycomb, Alabama from New York City for a long visit. 

When she first arrives she falls into the familiar rhythms of a small town where she seems to know most everyone. She rekindles a romance with her father's young protege and soon enough returns to scandalizing her aunt with her forward ways. Atticus Finch has become a physically frailer man, but his mind is still spry.

Harper Lee (1926-2016)

Everything about the trip seems to be going well until Jean Louise discovers a racist pamphlet among some papers of Atticus. She decides that she simply must sneak into a meeting of the Citizens' Council - a group of white men who are concerned about the NAACP and the burgeoning Civil Rights movement.

The meeting is in the same courtroom where Atticus Finch defended Tom Robinson and Jean Louise sneaks into the balcony to watch her father, just like she did in To Kill a Mockingbird. In that novel she saw her father do his best to defend a black man in a town that already knew his client was guilty.

In Go Set a Watchman, she sees her father and her serious boyfriend colluding with men who spout racist nonsense. She sees the hero fall - and fall hard.

Jean Louise's reaction was amazingly similar to my own as I listened to an icon of American literature debase himself - shock and disbelief. In my case, I knew it was coming, but I still hoped that maybe it had been exaggerated.

Everything seems to be falling apart around Jean Louise. She flees to her childhood home only to find it has been torn down and replaced by an ice cream stand. Calpurnia, the only mother figure she has ever known, rejects her. Her childhood is gone, her hero is gone and she is totally alone.

Clearly, there is a large bit of autobiography in this book - every bit as much as there was in To Kill a Mockingbird. One can easily imagine a young Harper Lee taking a similar trip back to Alabama and struggling with two versions of her hometown - the idealized version that she remembered from her childhood and the reality that falls short once she looks upon it with the eyes of an outsider.

Despite it all, I found myself enjoying this book. It is, in many ways, a more mature book than To Kill a Mockingbird. That being said, it is certainly not a stand-alone novel. You must read To Kill a Mockingbird before you read this book.

Reese Witherspoon read this audiobook and her lovely voice was an excellent choice.

I rate this audiobook 4 stars out of 5.

See my review of To Kill a Mockingbird here.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee.

TO KILL a MOCKINGBIRD (audiobook) by Harper Lee

Published by Harper Audio in 2008
Originally published in 1960
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize
Voted "Best Novel of the Century" in a Library Journal poll
Read by Sissy Spacek
Duration: 12 hours, 17 minutes

I almost feel silly writing a review for a book that is nearly universally regarded as one of the best, if not THE best, novels written in the last century. This book is read in schools across the country, was adapted into an amazingly successful movie that is as highly regarded as the book. This book is not just respected - it is loved.

I also hate to admit that it had been nearly 25 years since I had read To Kill a Mockingbird. Although I remembered that I loved the book, I had really forgotten why.

So, when I was offered the chance to review this audio version by the publisher for free I jumped it at. It had been such a long time that I needed to remind myself why it was so great. 

I am not going to waste everyone's time by re-telling the story in detail. Harper Lee creates a wonderfully rich world set in a small town in Alabama during the Great Depression. The story is told from the point of view of young "Scout" Finch. Scout starts as a first grader but the story progresses through several years. She lives with her brother Jem and her father Atticus, an attorney. Her daily life at home is maintained by the African American housekeeper Calpurnia who treats Jem and Scout like they are her own children. Later, her aunt moves in to provide a more permanent feminine role model in the house.

In the first part of the book, Scout's world comes to life as Harper Lee takes the time to lay out her world for us. In the second part of the book, this world is interrupted by an outrageous court case in which Atticus is appointed to defend a black man wrongfully accused of raping a white woman. The third part of the book deals with the consequences of that case. 

Harper Lee (born in 1926)  in c. 1962. 

But, the book is so much more than that. I grew up in a small town in Indiana and her descriptions of the rhythms of childhood play in the summer felt so true to me that the characters become so real that I felt like I actually knew them in my own childhood. 

Sissy Spacek's reading of this book is as timeless as the book itself. The decision not to have her actually change voices as she reads the story was a brilliant stroke. Most audiobook readers change voices and make separate voices for each of the characters even if it is told from the point of view of just one of the characters. Spacek keeps the entire story in the voice of Scout because the entire story is told from her point of view. It is her story.

I thoroughly enjoyed this audiobook. I found myself listening to it whenever I could. I happily rate it 5 stars out of 5.

See my review of Harper Lee's Go Set a Watchman here.

This book can be found on Amazon.com here: To Kill a Mockingbird.

This book was on a list of books to be investigated in Oklahoma by conservative parents. Here is a link to an article.

This book is also on lists of books that Progressives want to ban. Here is a link to a list maintained by a university that tracks book bans. In this case, it is for inclusion of the n-word.