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Summary: I really enjoyed this book. M.H. p.1
Review: This book was a good book. I really liked it a lot. Once I started to read I couldn't stop. The novel helped me to better understand the hard life that negroes had. The book starts out with a young girl named Scout who is about 8 when this book started. She lived in Maycomb County, Alabama with her brother Jem and father Atticus. Her father was a lawyer for a negroe who was convicted of rape on a white woman. Atticus gets called a lot of names that his children don't like, but they learn to understand that they need to just ignore it. I really liked this book because it teaches about life. If you are in a hard situation, you can learn from it. It teaches that not all people are treated the same. I really enjoyed the book and i reccomend this book to anyone who hasnt read it.
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Summary: A life learning story
Review: This book taught many life learning themes, which had some kind of moral to them. Scout, a main character and the narrator imposed innoncence in this story. Even today, this book is said to be one of the greatest in American literature. Overall, I enjoyed the book and its plot, in many ways, it showed a different perspective of life. As the book progressed, Jem and Scout matured and stopped playing most of the games they used to play on Boo Radley's house. Instead, of Tom Robinson losing his life, I wished he could have lived, but this would have changed the whole story. Near the end, the climax of the book was at its highest, when Jem and Scout were walking home from a school paegent. Fortunately, the main protagonist characters are not killed in the end of the story. Throughout the book, it carries the theme that all causes are worth a positive fight. Ultimately, this book should be read by people of all ages.
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Summary: Matt's inspired review of a five star novel
Review: "To Kill a Mockingbird" inspired me to look for the good in every man. It taught me that all men have a basic goodness about them. Even when evil men harm you, I learned not to judge quickly but to try to help them. This book was well written in several ways. The characters were well developed. I even felt as if i knew many of them by the time i finished the book. The settings of the book were described really well. I felt as if i had been to or even lived in many places in this book. The themes were popular and easy to relate to. Slavery, racism, and predjudice are still big issues today. Atticus taught his children that regardless of race, unusual manerisms, or social class, all people deserve fair treatment or the treatment they desire. To me, "To Kill a Mockingbird" is a must read book for all teachers, students, and literary fans.
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Summary: Everybody must read this book
Review: When first given 'To kill a Mockingbird' to read as a school assignment, I admit, I did dismiss it as another boring school book, but when I actually came to read it I realized that it I was very wrong. 'To kill a Mockingbird' is written through the eyes of Scout, an eight year-old recounting the past two years in a childlike innocent way. However, under the surface of her young vocabulary and speech patterns, there is a very mature voice telling us all some very important lessons for life. The childrens' father, Atticus, their housekeeper, Calpurnia and even Boo Radley show us the importance of respect and tolerance of other people, especially the importance of treating other races the same as our own. Every aspect of Maycomb society, even the bad racist side shows us how and how not to behave toward other people, without at any time appearing 'holier than thou' or pious. The wisdom of Atticus in using metaphors to explain the most important lessons in life to his children is evident: 'It is a sin to kill a mockingbird because all it does is sing its heart out for us'. He says this to his son, Jem as a warning to not shoot this type of bird, but also the deeper meaning of not destroying innocence or hating a black simply for the color of his skin. I recommend that anybody who has not already read this book read it as it is a beautiful book with very positive messages. I think the best part of Atticus's wisdom is when he says 'You can never fully understand a person until you get inside his skin.' Think about it.
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Summary: Did Harper Lee write only one novel because it was perfect?
Review: Harper Lee only wrote one novel, To Kill A Mockingbird. I think she only wrote one book because it was perfect.This is a story set the South of the Depression era. It's a story about injustice and prejudice and one man's attempt to stand up and do what is right. It is also about growing up and losing childhood innocence, about terror and about mis-judging all kinds of people. The theme of intolerance and fear plays itself out on many stages in this book, from the frightening character Boo Radley who is a strange recluse and a fairy-tale monster to the town's children, the black man Tom Robinson unjustly accused of raping a white woman, to the white-trash Ewells and Mayella Ewell herself, the supposed victim. All the horrors you usually hear about on daytime television are in this book, however their portrayal and the revelations are not shock TV but lessons about human weakness and human nobility. It's a great novel, written in such style that you can smell the dust, feel the humid heat and experience life in a small Southern town in the '30's. Just as an interesting bit of trivia, the character Dill, childhood friend of Scout and Jem, was in real life Truman Capote, a childhood friend of Harper Lee.
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Summary: The Hardships of Growing Up
Review: Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird is a timeless classic, the brightest, most realistic story of children growing up that could ever be told. A rarety amongst literature, To Kill A Mockingbird develops charcters that we care for, and anger that we feel towards the way we, the American people, once were. The book does drag a bit at some parts, mainly the beginning, but the overall concept and emotion that stays with the reader upon the conclusion of the novel, far overshadows any down point in the book. We watch as both children and adults, grow through the pages, their knowledge, but most of all, their feelings towards Tom Robinson and his family; it transcends and develops into a love far untouched in any other novel of its kind. To Kill A Mockingbird is a heartfelt book, which will be remembered for many years to come.
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Summary: What a read!
Review: In a recent writing assignment, my son noted: My mom chose Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird as our family book club's March book. I flipped through, saw the number of pages, and thought, "Boring!" Later that night, I read the first page and discovered that the main character's brother was about my age and wanted to play football and own an air rifle. Then, a few days later, I continued reading and even though I found the writing a little "fancy," I was finally able to find the beauty of Lee's book - it's a pretty "grown-up" story, but it's seen through the eyes of kids like me. That makes hard subjects easier to understand, which makes the book so much more interesting. The novel is told from a young girl's perspective. Because the theme of racism, the subject of rape, and the idea of injustice are a little "over the top" - even for bright readers -Lee chose a young narrator to tell the story of a black man falsely accused of raping a young white woman and one man's fight to free him. If the story had been told by an adult, readers would have to suffer through the unnecessary chit-chat, opinions, and worries of that perspective. Seeing Maycomb County through Scout's innocent eyes, however, prevents this "masterpiece of American literature" from being an "I-had-to-read-it" sort of book. Scout, her brother Jem, and their father form one of many families of Maycomb County, Alabama. In that southern state during the Great Depression, "[t]here was no hurry for there was nowhere to go, nothing to buy, and no money to buy it with, nothing to see outside the boundaries of Maycomb County." As the novel begins, Scout is six and about to start school, where she will be criticized for coming to class already knowing how to read and write. Her young teacher scolds Scout: "Now you tell your father not to teach you anymore. It's best to begin reading with a fresh mind. You tell him I'll take over from here and try to undo the damage." (p. 17) Jem, a fifth-grader, allows his sister to join him in many of his adventures, including his plans with Dill to make Boo Radley come out. But he thinks Scout "is getting more like a girl every day." (p. 52) The children's father, Atticus Finch, is a state legislator and one of the county's leading lawyers. He is selected to defend Tom Robinson, a Negro accused of rape. Racism still exists today, but the problems don't compare to those described in To Kill a Mocking Bird. The main problem seems to be that Negroes are considered the least human of four kinds of people. As Jem tells Scout, "There's four kinds of folks in the world. There's the ordinary kind like us and the neighbors, there's the kind like the Cunninghams out in the woods, the kind like the Ewells down at the dump, and the Negroes." (p. 226) To make the point about Negroes being somehow less important than other folks, the author tells Tom's story. He is a Negro whose left arm is stripped of muscle from a childhood accident. He stops to help nineteen-year-old Mayella Ewell with several chores because, as Tom admits at his trial, "I felt right sorry for her, she seemed to try more'n the rest of 'em" - referring to her family, who gathers their supplies from the nearby dump and whose father is a drunkard who beats them. When Bob Ewell catches his daughter hugging the black man, he accuses Tom of raping Mayella to save their family from disgrace. "And so a quiet, respectable, humble Negro who had the unmitigated temerity to 'feel sorry' for a white woman has had to put his word against two white people's." (p. 204) Atticus Finch does his best to make Tom a free man. His efforts, though, only buy more time from the jury, which still returns a guilty verdict. Unlike her brother, Scout believes that "there's just one kind of folks. Folks." But Tom still ends up dead - shot as he tries to escape from punishment for a crime he did not (could not) commit. To Kill a Mockingbird could be a pretty "heavy" book for young readers if it only concentrated on racism, rape, and Atticus Finch's unsuccessful attempt to free an innocent man. So Lee combines the story of Tom Robinson with the mythology surrounding the inscrutable Mr. Arthur Radley, whom Jem, Scout, and their summertime friend Dill call Boo Radley. One story about Boo is that he stabbed his father with scissors while cutting newspapers for his scrapbook. Another story has Boo scratching neighbors' door screens. Yet another says that he eats squirrels. Kids love creepy stories, and the antics of the three friends as they try to make Boo come out of his house give the novel light and humor. Although I had a rough time "getting into" To Kill a Mockingbird, when I finally did I was surprised by how good it was. By the way, the book has such a cool title. I didn't understand it at all when I began the book. Then, in chapter 10, I realized where the title came from. "Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don't eat up people's gardens, don't nest in corncribs, they don't do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mockingbird." (p. 90) But not until Scout says to her father, "Well, it'd be sort of like shootin' a mockingbird, wouldn't it?" (p. 270), did I realize who the book's mockingbirds were. I will read this book with my children someday and hope they will with theirs.
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Summary: The second book I ever loved!
Review: This book is an absolute masterpiece!....If you haven't read it....READ IT NOW!
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Summary: The Greatest Book Ever!!
Review: This by far is my most favorite book!! My older bother, by 5 years, my senior, gave me this book after he read it for school. I absolutly loved this book, at first I thought my vocabulary wouldn't match and I wouldn't be able to understand the concept. I was surprised that the narator was a child. TO make this a short story, I loved and that I think everyone should read this book!!
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Summary: Tired of Longggggg Reviews??
Review: This book is a charming love story that involves kids growing up and tells what they feel about the adult world's hypocrisy, discrimination, anger, and frustration. Kids' father tried very hard to accomodate them with what's going on in the world that they are not ready to accept, but the kids' purity made him feel helpless in explaining the evil of this world. U must understand the book is told by a young girl who has a incredible amount of vocabulary and remembers everything a person says (like Dr. Watson). So try to get use to it, if u are not charmed by the story which i am sure that won't happen, u will still like the surprising and abstruse ending.
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