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Summary: The Best Book I've Read
Review: this book is truly moving. i've read it numerous times and i love it more each time. the loss of inocence is depicted beautifully in this book. the town of maycomb is the perfect setting for such a beautiful book.
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Summary: Outstanding literature
Review: It's novels like this that make literature so beautiful. Harper Lee writes one of the best, most touching novels you'll ever read. I absolutely loved it....and to think I would have never read it unless I was forced to in school. This is what makes us so happy to have English classes that force us to read books that we think we won't like. =) "To Kill a Mockingbird" is a beautiful piece of literature, but you have to allow yourself to get into it. Like most other books, you have to get through the humdrum of the beginning in order to get into it. This novel follows the escapades of 12-year-old Jem and his little sister Scout in the 1930's. What they experience in a short period of time will change their lives forever. There isn't much to say about this novel. It's heartrending, touching, and thoroughly engaging, and the writing is among the best I've ever seen in one novel. Harper Lee deserves all the recognition she receives for this moving account on living life and growing up. I definitely recommend that you buy this novel, but the only way you can come to love it so much is if you are patient with Harper Lee's deep writing style and if you allow yourself to feel the human emotions of the characters. It's a beautiful story with a lot of meaning and depth. Well worth every piece of your money, that's for sure!
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Summary: To Kill a Mockingbird
Review: Harper Lee opens the pressing issue of discrimination through the eyes of an innocent child in a small southern town.
Harper Lee tells the story of a young girl growing up in a small town where she witnesses the discrimination of race, gender, and class through everyday happenings in her town. The reader is moved to ponder the reasons for prejudice as the main character, Scout, does when the results of racism cause the death of an innocent man. The characters interest the reader and the events make the reader think about important life situations faced by people every day.
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Summary: Best book I have ever read!
Review: This book is the journey of a lifetime for a reader. You cannot put this book down. This is definately a must-read book. Also see the video version of the book. They are both fantastic.
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Summary: Gets Better With Age
Review: I first read this book for an English class in high school and hated it. Luckily, I recently bought this hardcover edition and read it again. It's now one of my favorites. I'm sure there's plenty of other reviews that deal with the plot, but I'd like to emphasize the brilliant characters in this book.Atticus Finch has easily become one of my most favorite literary characters. Lee's brilliance with Finch is that while as the plot unfold you see what a truly great man he is, she shows her audience his flaws as well. This makes him a very complete and rounded character. Scout's also great - she's wise beyond her years, which makes reading a book that centers around such a young character enjoyable. Besides these two great characters, it also is a wonderful book.
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Summary: One of my favorite classics.
Review: "To Kill a Mockingbird" is mainly about the trial of a black man for raping a white woman -- an offense not taken lightly in 1930s Alabama. And while a rape trial is very serious topic, Harper Lee chooses to write the book from the point of view of an eight-year-old girl. She takes her time getting around to the trial, writing at length about the exploits of Scout, her brother Jem, and their friend Dill. There are lots of laughs -- particularly the night the three of them went to see Boo Radley's house, and Jem ripped his pants so badly he had to return home without them. There are also lots of tearful moments, especially after Tom Robinson got convicted and after he died. He hadn't raped the girl and everyone in town knew it, but essentially he was condemned from the moment after Mayella screamed. The ending, however, is sort of a happy one in spite of what happened to Tom. Yet, not all people in town are racist rednecks. Harper Lee does not go into stereotype. Plenty of white people supported Tom Robinson, Atticus most of all. I met a woman who named her son after Atticus Finch, and after reading the book I can see why. He was my favorite character in the book because of his high-mindedness and fair sense of justice. All in all a terrific piece of work, one that will make its readers think differently after they're done.
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Summary: A well crafted masterpiece
Review: Harper Lee spent years crafting this classic novel of life in small town Alabama in the mid 1930s. Ms Lee wrote a first draft which her editors felt read more like a series of interconnected short stories rather than as a cohesive novel so, she went back to the drawing board and ultimately produced this popignant tale of life as seen through the eyes of an adult narrator remembering her childhood. I read this book for a reason. My son, a high school student read this as an assignment for his honors English class. As an attorney, his teacher asked me to talk about life as a lawyer before the class. She mentioned this book in particular so I read it to compare my experiences with those of the novel's main character, Atticus Finch. I'm glad that I read it. I have seen the movie a couple of times but, the book offers great character analyses which cannot be duplicate on the screen (although the movie does a reasonable amount of justice to the book). The book was written in the late 1950s and completed in 1960, as the evils of the Jim Crow era were coming to a head. Ms Lee could have painted portraits of good guys and bad guys, however, she looks affectionately upon most of the characters, seeing them as complex individuals. Therefore, she confronts their prejudices with understanding rather than in anger or self righteousness. Also, she does not paint the deep South of that time as monolithically rascist. There are those, in the book, who rise above narrow prejudice. Again, I read the book to be able to comment on the legal system portrayed therein. However, I got much more out of this book; a beautiful and compassionate character study.
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Summary: Enjoyable guilt?
Review: Books I consider exemplary have a few qualities: straightforward but engaging narration, likable characters, and a plot which examines "issues" without becoming strained in doing so. To Kill a Mockingbird possesses each of these qualities. What makes it especially outstanding is the point of view and what is left unsaid. One main driver of the plot is an incident which we never witness and only learn of through some testimony. One of the main characters in relation to the plot we spend a scant few pages with--we never really know him in order to sympathize with him as a character. And another main character, Atticus, though extraordinarily quiet, maintains a powerful presence reminiscent of Howard Roark in Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead. The simplicity and one-sided nature of the trial can be considered a shortcoming, but they actually make the novel's point that much more powerful. It's believable that the jury would find Tom guilty despite his obvious innocence, and this emphasizes how much man can be cruelly unfair to his neighbor. The ending does seem a bit strained as Atticus somehow is unable to see who killed whom when his children were attacked, but this is a very minor flaw. Overall To Kill a Mockingbird tells a powerful, emotional tale with the easy childhood innocence of its narrator. It makes the reader feel tremendously guilty, seeing what we as a society could be vs. what we unfortunately are. If we interpret this not as an accusation by Lee but rather as an inspiration then maybe we can improve things a bit.
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Summary: The best book ever!
Review: To Kill a Mockingbird is probably one of the greatest books ever written. The novel is morally fantastic. The novel is about a family that lives in the south in a community that is dealing with a controversial racial issue. Scout and Jem are young kids that learn valuable lessons while they are growing up. They know that all people should be created equal. For instance, Scout ventures to a black church and does not think anything about it. Atticus Finch, Scout and Jem's father, represents a black man that has been charged with rape. Clearly, the black man is innocent, and Atticus Finch wants to do the right thing. In conclusion, To Kill a Mockingbird is a wonderful book that is full of great moral examples that people should follow. One of the highlights of the book is Atticus Finch saying, "Before you say anything bad about someone, walk a mile in their shoes."
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Summary: Great for Study Guides
Review: In my English class we were required to read this book. Although I did read the novel we were told to complete a study guide with the novel. We were often asked to describe certain characters and the cliff notes helped a lot. Also if I missed a night of the reading it was simple just to scan the cliff notes and then read the novel in detail later. All in all, this cliff notes book was very helpful, but I do recommend that you read the novel because it is great.
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