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Entertainment
Helen Davidson in Darwin; Matthew Weaver in London; Lanre Bakare and Michelle Dean in New York

Go Set a Watchman: first chapter released - as it happened

Pulitzer Prize winner and
To Kill A Mockingbird author Harper Lee, said to be ‘happy as hell’ about her new novel, Go Set A Watchman Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Well, reactions are winding down so we’re going to wind down this liveblog too. Those of you still Harper Lee-obsessed and looking to watch and read on may want to have a look at this take from Bloomberg News, which updates us on the intrigue surrounding its publication. One interesting tidbit it reveals is that the editors and Lee’s lawyer, Tonja Carter, debated editing the n-word out of the original manuscript:

Already, the decision to leave it as is has made some anxious. For example, “there was some concern from Tonja’s end about the word ‘n-----.’ It’s in there quite a lot,” says Nurnberg. “I said, ‘This book was written in the 1950s. You can’t call someone a n----- by any other anodyne title.’ ”

Also, tonight PBS will air a 2012 documentary tonight called Hey Boo, prepared by Lee’s friend Mary Murphy. (Check your local listings.) According to PBS, the documentary has been updated, and Murphy also apparently filmed a recent meeting with Lee, at which the ailing author was presented with a copy of her new book.

Murphy plans to tweet during the broadcast on the hashtag #HarperLeePBS, if you want to ask questions about the full book.

This just in from my colleague Lindesay Irvine: William Hill have set the odds on Go Set a Watchman winning the Booker Prize at 33/1. (Irvine points out that’s roughly the same as they set Bob Dylan’s odds of winning the Nobel, every year.)

William Hill also have the odds of Go Set a Watchman breaking the 20-week-atop-the-bestseller-list record recently set by The Girl on a Train at 10/1.

Hello, I’m Michelle Dean, taking over for Lanre here as we continue to track reactions to the first chapter. You can tell that fatigue is setting in as some at the literary ends Twitter have started to have a little fun with the title of the book. It’s a Biblical quotation, but it sounds quite a bit more modern to a few observers...

I admit to having had the impulse to joke, myself.

Another gem from Mr Irvine here, who’s pointed me towards the LA Times report from Monroeville, Alabama, the hometown of Harper Lee and her childhood friend and neighbour Truman Capote.

Truman Capote’s childhood home in Monroeville
Truman Capote’s childhood home in Monroeville Photograph: Jay Reeves/AP

As you might expect the place has embraced the release of Go Set a Watchman and turned it into a real event, replete with a Gregory Peck imitator. Ol’ Curiosities and Book Shoppe sounds great too:

On the day of the book’s launch, the Monroeville Chamber of Commerce will serve lemonade and teacakes and the museum will do a marathon read of “Go Set a Watchman” the same way it did for “To Kill a Mockingbird’s” 50th anniversary, also in the courtroom. “It will be a first-come, first-serve for whoever wants to read,” says Stephanie Rogers, director of the museum. “We just want to honor Miss Lee.”

Monroeville’s population is just over 6,000 residents, and the local bookstore, Ol’ Curiosities and Book Shoppe, has already presold 7,000 copies of the new book from local and nonlocal sales. The bookstore’s release party (from midnight to 2am Monday night) will include finger food and a Gregory Peck imitator.

Sounds like a riot. There’s also a nice anecdote about a Harper Lee and a comma:

“She looked at it and said there should be no comma after the word ‘Go,’ ” says Sentell. “It was then pointed out to her by one of the editors that in the King James Version of Isaiah 21:6 there is a comma.” According to Sentell, Lee responded, ‘That’s the Lord’s Book. This is my book. And there is no comma.’”

Can’t argue with that.

Updated

My colleague and R Kelly fan, Lindesay Irvine, has directed me to this St Louis Dispatch report, which is all about people naming their children after Harper Lee characters.

Maybe we’re in for a future of solemn, nearsighted, fair-minded lawyers, all named Atticus.

Well, they won’t all be lawyers. “I hope not,” said Susan Barrett with a laugh.

But she does hope her little Atticus, just 4, grows up with a strong sense of justice.

Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch
Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch Photograph: Universal Pictures/Getty Images

Despite that slightly dystopian opening sentence, things brighten up with an interesting look at the people who’ve named their children not only after Harper Lee characters and literary stars, but possibly Guardian journalists:

Heidi Langston of Jackson, Mo., also thinks her daughter Scout will love books. Scout is the nickname of Atticus Finch’s youngest in “Mockingbird,” and Langston said she detects the fictional character’s tomboy feistiness in her daughter.

Scout is one of three — her brother is named Salinger and her sister Hadley.

But Heidi Langston is in the minority, as most parents don’t opt to go for Scout, it’s actually Harper and Atticus which are the most popular:

Scout is still an unusual name, according to Social Security figures. Last year, only nine newborn girls in the state of Missouri were named Scout.

But over the last decade, both Harper and Atticus have skyrocketed in popularity. Harper, which nationwide ranked 887th for newborn girls in 2004, actually ranked 11th in 2014. Atticus rose from 937th in 2004 to rank 370th in popularity for male babies in 2014.

When it comes to reading poses, no one can really touch Steve Connolly.

Book in one hand, feet on desk, finger pointed at a bright orange sign to promote one of the most anticipated literary releases of the last decade. Nice work, Steve.

PS - Steve, hope this doesn’t get you in trouble with your boss.

As someone who tried to avoid Game of Thrones spoilers I can sympathise with those who are trying to hold off until 14 July for the full release. Good luck, Mandi!

Others are feeling profound …

Some pointed out the clear missed opportunity for Lee to mention, er, sharks

Atticus Fish?
Atticus Fish? Photograph: AP

A couple of comments from the thread now, as people recall the first time they read To Kill a Mockingbird.

User avatar for TaraH Guardian staff

Read it in high school, then in a university survey course "Exploring Humanities through Film" where we looked at the film too. I read the first chapter with my 11-year-old daughter a couple of months ago. I'd forgotten how tricksy the language is, easier to read to oneself than to read aloud. So many strong figures, Scout, Atticus, Boo Radley, Tom Robinson (tho I had to look up his name! Sad), such a heady, precise setting. And for a northern girl, I was completely absorbed by the children's story, and consternation at how injustices so obvious to an innocent could be so complicated.

User avatar for Liofa73

We read TKAM in high school when I was about 14.

Our English teacher used to put on a deep south accent (she was English) when it was her turn to read aloud.

I used to find it a bit weird, but thinking back it was quite special really, I can't imagine many teachers doing that now, they would probably be too afraid of ridicule from students.

While Reese Witherspoon’s narration won over some readers (listeners?) …

User avatar for Sherman Ellen

At first I wanted Reece to read faster, then I settled in and was determined to use patients. By the time the train pulled to its stop I was hooked. No longer reading fiction at my age, I will make an exception for this wonderful step into the past. Thank you Harper Lee for making it summer again.

Matthew Weaver’s just sent me this snippet …

Alabama-based arts reporter Carla Jean Whitley was so excited by the publication of the first chapter that she has already read it twice.

Speaking to the BBC’s World Service, she said:

“It is easy for me to see, as someone who has lived in Alabama for most of my life, that significant progress has been definitely been made [since To Kill a Mockingbird was published]. But no it has not been enough. I’ve worked in news rooms where people have thought it was perfectly acceptable to hate black people. That is horrifying, especially in the 2000s but horrifying at any point, and yet I look around me now and I see so much beauty and integration.”

Sobering stuff.

Hello all. Lanre Bakare, here.

I’ll be helming the live blog for the next hour or so.

More reaction from around the world now, with CNN’s write up of the first chapter reminding everyone just how much of a big deal this is, while somehow working in a mention of ABBA:

Is this really as unlikely as an ABBA reunion?
Is this really as unlikely as an ABBA reunion? Photograph: Alamy

In the history of publishing it’s hard to think of a longer lead-in time to a second novel, or a more highly-anticipated publication. The book’s first chapter has appeared, in a coordinated, global publicity campaign, Friday. Think Salinger goes on The View, or ABBA reforming, in terms of Least Likely Events to Happen. That Lee would release a second novel is an incredible, stunning second act.

Not sure about the Least Likely Events to Happen thing … surely that’d be The Smiths getting back together? Anyway, I digress …

Meanwhile, down under, the Sydney Morning Herald, focuses on the mad rush to get the book from the printers to Australian readers:

… as a publishing prospect, Go Set A Watchman is both review and scandal-proof: having topped bestseller charts on pre-orders alone, it will be rolled out to bookshops and e-readers in a co-ordinated global release strictly controlled from London. The campaign leaves nothing to chance, and has left local publishing reps mostly in the dark.

No one – even, it is understood, in the most senior ranks at Australia’s Penguin Random House – will see it before it hits stores. There will be no advance reviews. Bookshops will face an early-morning scramble to get it on the shelves once the boxes are delivered.

You can see more work by the illustrator Tom Clohosy Cole on his Instagram page.

Some readers are queasy about giving the first chapter the live blog treatment.

But there is a almost universal praise for the way the Guardian, and illustrator Tom Cole, have presented the chapter.

“It’s a book that if you picked off the shelf you would absolutely want to continue reading,” says Sinéad Crowley arts and media correspondent at Ireland’s RTE News after sampling the first chapter.

Updated

International lawyer Philippe Sands (see earlier) likes what he’s read so far and is eager of for more.

As she tucks into a water mellon on a Spanish island, writer Linda Grant has asked her Twitter followers what they make of the first chapter.

“Very promising” is the verdict of Times literary editor Robbie Millen.

There are only 3,679 words by which to judge it, but these first words reveal that Go Set a Watchman has some of the warmth, good humour and sense of place of To Kill a Mockingbird. It reads like Harper Lee, it feels like Mockingbird. The only real difference, so far, is that Watchman is not told in the first person through the eyes of Scout ...

There are a couple of gently comic scenes, which will put readers in mind of Mockingbird — “Trains changed; conductors never did. Being funny at flag stops with young ladies was a mark of the profession.”

There is also the same sense of the importance of family background and one’s standing in the community (“Henry Clinton was Jean Louise’s own kind”). Also as in Mockingbird, there is a familiar passage on Colonel Maycomb and the foundation of Maycomb County, though the historical details are different.

In this short extract we can see the seeds of future conflict, of the city girl returning to the deep South. Living in New York clearly has changed Jean Louise. At a superficial level, she dresses differently. On the train “she put on her Maycomb clothes: gray slacks, a black sleeveless blouse, white socks, and loafers”. Within minutes of arriving, she has rowed with Hank.

Looking out of the train window, delighting at the passing scenery, “She wondered why she had never thought her country beautiful.”

Though this first chapter is suffused with the nostalgia of homecoming, you get the strong sense, that the times are a-changin’ and it won’t necessarily make for a happy ending. Very promising.

The intervening decades have worked a bittersweet magic on Go Set a Watchman, writes Xan Brooks in his first take on opening chapter.

Back in the mid-1950s, when these words were set down, Lee’s prose would have come across as easy, elegant and assured. In 2015, knowing all that we do, her bright rush of information arrives with the force of a blow to the chest.

Take, for instance, what many will single out as the chapter’s key line: “She had turned from an overalled, fractious, gun-slinging creature into a reasonable facsimile of a human being.” Originally meant to sketch Watchman’s 26-year-old protagonist, it has since turned on its head to become a piercing elegy for the six-year-old Scout, who grew up and changed. Elsewhere the pages contain other shocks that might have blown merrily past our ears were it not for the fact that we have spent time with these people. We are told that a major character from Mockingbird later died suddenly, and that unbending, heroic Atticus Finch suffers from rheumatoid arthritis and is too sick to make the drive out to the station.

“His hands and shoulders are giving him fits today,” explains young Hank Clinton, who drives out in his stead. Hank, we learn, loves Jean Louise and she very nearly loves him back. Tellingly, Lee’s beautifully-written introduction ends with the two in the car heading home, and with a jokey, intimate exchange that turns several shades darker when viewed at a distance. Jean Louise (whom I still think of as Scout) is delighted to see Hank but suspects the relationship might flounder outside Maycomb County. And while she is pleased to be home, her happiness is cut with an undercurrent of sadness.

Lee’s first chapter has the blessing of Friar Lee Barrett, a priest at St. Paul’s Cramlington, in Northumberland.

Some potential readers are battling the temptation to read the first chapter, for various reasons.

Updated

Perhaps picqued as being being described as the Atticus Finch of international law (see earlier) Phillipe Sands has pointed out that being an old lawyer is not all glamour.

Sands is a sprightly 55.

Updated

Lauren Collins of the New Yorker is not impressed by a Spectator drawing of Harper Lee.

Bernie Ecclestone
Bernie Ecclestone Photograph: Pierre Andrieu/AFP/Getty Images

She has a point.


Matilda Battersby, digital arts editor Independent, picks out five things we’ve learned from the first chapter (more spoiler alerts). It includes this verdict on the distinctiveness of Lee’s voice.

Who else could litter their achingly concise prose with words like “overweening” and “perspicacious” without coming off like a pretentious unmentionable? Scout’s conscious naivety, her humour, the dialogue and the unlaboured but brilliantly drawn description of the red earth and verbena of Maycomb take one right back to the halcyon days of To Kill A Mockingbird. It is like an old friend turning up unannounced after decades without contact only for the conversation to flow as it always did. Some have commented that the written voice is almost ghostly – which it is, being so firmly rooted in a time and space that is hardly recognisable. Scout’s priorities, and her position as one of literature’s loudest and most important advocates for civil rights, are still made clear, however subtly, as she smiles joyously within the first paragraph at signs that inequality is beginning to change in her home town: “She grinned when she saw her first TV antenna atop an unpainted Negro house; as they multiplied, her joy rose.”

Some bookshops and cinemas across the world are building up to the publication of the full version of Go Set a Watchman by showing screenings of the acclaimed film version of To Kill a Mockingbird.

The opening credits alone are brilliant.

Philippe Sands, the Atticus Finch of international law, is excited.

Harper Lee’s description of golf in the first chapter sounds like the words of an old pro. She writes:

Her favourite game was golf because its essential principles consisted of a stick, a small ball, and a state of mind.

It is sure to be added to an already long list of famous golfing quotes. It even sounds like some of them, for example Lon Hinkle remark: “Golf is golf. You hit the ball, you go find it. Then you hit it again,” or Mike Weir’s “Out here, it’s just you and the ball.”

But it can’t match that other great literary verdict on the game. “Golf is a good walk spoiled,” according to Mark Twain.

Ryder Cup golfers Sam Snead and Max Faulkner practise before the competition at Wentworth in 1953.
Ryder Cup golfers Sam Snead and Max Faulkner practise before the competition at Wentworth in 1953. Photograph: George Douglas/Getty Images

Claire Armitstead
Claire Armitstead Photograph: Frank Baron for the Guardian

Is Go Set a Watchman as good as To Kill a Mockingbird? Guardian Books editor Claire Armitstead was asked the question on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, home of the set piece political interview.

Claire gave a politician’s answer:

It is really difficult, you can’t [say]. But what it sets up is lots of fascinating scenarios. The childhood friendships have gone ... Obviously Scout has a romantic association with the Black community which I suspect is going to really develop. It has also got a nice line in irony. It has this line: ‘Recorded history’s version does not coincide with the truth, but these are the facts, because [they were passed down by word of mouth through the years] and every Maycombian knows them.’

So it is sort of setting up the idea of a reality that doesn’t accord with the facts. And I think it is actually really promising.

“While the novel shares literary DNA with Ms. Lee’s famous debut — the same wry humor, biting banter and finely drawn characters flicker throughout — this is clearly a different story,” writes Alexandra Alter in the New York Times.

Here’s part of her first take on the new chapter:

While the book will almost certainly face heavy scrutiny as fans and scholars compare it with her acclaimed masterpiece, it is already destined to be a major commercial success ...

Whether the book will resonate with fans and critics, though, remains to be seen. Ms. Lee wrote “Watchman” in the mid-1950s, and she set it aside when her editor told her to rewrite it from the perspective of Scout as a child — advice that gave rise to the story that would become “Mockingbird.” When the news of the publication was announced last February, questions quickly arose about why Ms. Lee, who had long claimed she was satisfied with her single contribution to American literature, decided to release it after all this time.

But whether or not it holds up to her Pulitzer Prize-winning debut novel, “Watchman” will offer readers an unprecedented and unfiltered look into the mind and creative process of one of the country’s most revered and enigmatic authors. The novel, however flawed, promises to shed new light on familiar characters, and to offer a rare look at the unedited prose of a writer who was so rattled by fame and the weight of expectations that, for decades, it seemed all but certain that she would never publish another word.

Blowing our own trumpet alert...

Lots of readers have been impressed by the way Guardian has presented the chapter.

Some readers are so sad about the killing off of Jem that they wish they hadn’t read the chapter.

Others are revelling in the misery.

Librarian Louise Penn has a neat summary of the chapter.

Here’s one of the first outwardly hostile verdicts to the first chapter from Susan Harris from Words Without Borders.

Some readers have quibbles about the new chapter.

But Anne Margaret Daniel, a professor of literature at the New School in New York, is already in tears.

Updated

Independent book seller Jon Page challenges fellow book shop owners not to feature Go Set A Watchman in their window display.

Updated

Fans of To Kill a Mockingbird are in collective mourning for Scout’s brother Jem. Two-thirds of the way through the opening chapter of Go Set a Watchmam we learn that Jem died soon after the second world war. Lee breaks it to readers with no more than a clause in a sentence.

Just about that time, Jean Louise’s brother dropped dead in his tracks one day, and after the nightmare of that was over, Atticus, who had always thought of leaving his practice to his son, looked around for another young man.

Here’s a sample of the shock and grief from readers...

Updated

Before I hand over to my colleague Matthew Weaver, let’s get a few more quick reviews in from your comments and Twitter. The first one in particular I am in rather strong agreement with.

User avatar for Danielle Binks

Just marvelling at how much this novel speaks to current times in America: "Maycomb County was so cut off from the rest of the nation that some of its citizens, unaware of the South’s political predilections over the past ninety years, still voted Republican."

Given the debate over the Confederate Flag in the South, and more precisely, the terrible event that sparked that debate, this is chilling.

User avatar for JacksBackAndAngry

Love the style and the 'feel' of the narrative.....but.....but....my mind kept wandering, what's with all the musing, I thought? Ach, it's just me, a middle aged male non-fiction reader.

Did you know Harper Lee was a neighbour of Truman Capote when they were kids? They stayed in touch and if I am correct Harper Lee went with him on some of his travels when researching 'In cold blood'.

Go Set a Watchman is both the most pre-ordered book since Harry Potter, and seemingly the most highly-guarded.

This is a really interesting look at the distribution process of the book, from the Wall Street Journal. The whole article is worth a read, but here is an extract:

Shipping a book to Azerbaijan usually takes two months but for next week’s release of Harper Lee’s “Go Set a Watchman,” an air courier has been enlisted to make sure copies arrive by Tuesday. Printing presses in Australia and India are cranking out editions for local markets. At Powell’s Books in Portland, Ore., the manager of the chain’s airport shop is prepared to personally pick up copies at the warehouse, if necessary, and get them on the shelves by Tuesday morning.

The book has unleashed a sweeping and secretive rollout unusual for any novel, much less one written more than 50 years ago. Publishers and booksellers, in hopes of keeping millions of copies under wraps, have adopted security measures such as shrink-wrapped boxes and storage areas monitored by closed-circuit television. Stores and libraries in more than 70 countries are preparing to unpack and display the books at the last minute.

This was a great news report from the ABC’s 7.30 program on Thursday. Reporter Ben Knight visited Lee’s town of Monroeville, Alabama, to see how they felt about the new book. (Apologies to those outside of Australia who are geoblocked from watching the video, but there is still a full transcript.)

The Guardian’s Alison Flood has had a look at the first chapter. Read her piece in full, which looks at both the content and clues in the extract, as well as the controversy around it.

The first chapter... reveals a witty, dry voice immediately recognisable as that of the To Kill a Mockingbird author. Jean Louise is shown to be grappling with two things as she comes home. Atticus, an almost godlike figure to the Scout of Mockingbird, is now in constant pain. “She was too old to rail against the inequity of it, but too young to accept her father’s crippling disease without putting up some kind of fight … She wondered how she would behave when her time came to hurt day in and day out.”

She is also pondering whether or not she should marry a childhood friend of her brother’s, who muses ruefully that “most women, before they’ve got ’em, present to their men smiling, agreeing faces. They hide their thoughts. You now, when you’re feeling hateful, honey, you are hateful.”

A few quick reviews from the Guardian Australia staff, who are a tough crowd.

What can you really judge about a book from one chapter? At first reading this felt uneven, awkward, too full of exposition. At second reading I thought her relationship with the protagonist sounded... potentially interesting. And there’s beauty in the description. So in precis: not sure yet, but promising. - Emily Wilson

I thought it was pretty clunky. Two nice turns of phrase – the one about Cousin Joshua’s poetry and the one about the troops and settlers being her ancestors – but otherwise so full of cliches and implausible dialogue that it’s pretty hard to read. - Alan Evans

I listened rather than read and it sounded like someone reminiscing, which I guess is what it is, but in a vaguely annoying way. It verged on stream of consciousness but was also over-written; at times evocative, more often twee (though that may have been Witherspoon’s accent). If it was intended to leave me wanting me more and seeking answers, it didn’t. - Fred McConnell

Updated

People are starting to finish up with the chapter and give their first impressions on social media. I’d love to hear yours in the comments.
Here are a few spoiler-free Twitter reviews to get the ball rolling.

Perhaps an interactive animated edition is more your style?

Don’t want to read the first chapter of Go Set a Watchman yourself? How about listening to Oscar-winning actress Reese Witherspoon read it to you instead?

While I wait patiently for readers to finish the chapter, some responses are coming in to my earlier request for when you first read To Kill a Mockingbird.

It sounds lovely, IlovetheBrits!

User avatar for IlovetheBrits

Taught high school for thirty years. TKAM on our list every year. First time was a little bush school (now a famous wine-growing region down south in Western Australia)... so, a hot Aussie summer afternoon, fan ticking around in the classroom ceiling... a voice.. "Miss, read us a bit more of To Kill a Mockingbird, please".
Ah, what a life. And then the movie... further bliss.
Memories.

If you were wondering just how quickly people in the digital age will tweet about something they’re reading, here is your answer.

Read the first chapter of Go Set a Watchman

It’s time! I hope you have your afternoon coffee ready, and the phone off the hook. Who even needs a weekend with so much excitement on a Friday.

Read it here, then please come back and tell me what you think.

Be first to read the opening chapter of Harper Lee’s new book, “Go Set a Watchman” today! We’ll have it on the site at 2pm (AEST). Head totheguardian.com then and don’t miss out.
Be first to read the opening chapter of Harper Lee’s new book, “Go Set a Watchman” today! We’ll have it on the site at 2pm (AEST). Head totheguardian.com then and don’t miss out. Photograph: Tom Clohosy Cole for the Guardian/Tom Clohosy Cole for the Guardian

Updated

This is so great – a quiz for the kids (and adults). How well do you remember To Kill a Mockingbird? I got eight out of ten, but to be honest, I did a quick refresher course this morning on the google. Should probably read the book again.

Updated

My Australian colleague Paul Farrell is a big fan of To Kill a Mockingbird. He’s shared his thoughts on a favourite quote from the book.

One of To Kill a Mockingbird’s most enduring features is Harper Lee’s portrayal of Atticus Finch. He represents the very best of the law and the idea of due process. My favourite scene in To Kill a Mockingbird is Atticus Finch’s powerful courtroom showdown. It’s an incredible moment that has quite probably inspired a generation of lawyers. During the hearing, Finch gets up and says:

“We know all men are not created equal in the sense some people would have us believe – some people are smarter than others, some people have more opportunity because they’re born with it, some men make more money than others, some ladies make better cakes than others – some people are born gifted beyond the normal scope of most men.

“But there is one way in this country in which all men are created equal – there is one human institution that makes a pauper the equal of a Rockefeller, the stupid man the equal of any Einstein and the ignorant man the equal of any college president. That institution, gentlemen, is a court.”

These lines are as powerful – and relevant – today as they were 50 years ago.

Updated

Book people and their jokes, hey?

The chapter will be released soon! Contain your literary excitement for a moment, and let’s get this book club going. I’d like to hear when you first read To Kill a Mockingbird, if you reread it later in life, and why you think it is (or isn’t) such an important book. The comment box is just down there. *Points at the bottom of the page*

Updated

The artwork

Just in case you thought this book could not be more overhyped or analysed before we can get our hands on it, the managing designer at HarperCollins, Stuart Bache, has taken us through the book jackets for Go Set a Watchman.

Harper Lee - Go Set a Watchman Cover
Harper Lee - Go Set a Watchman Cover Illustration: Harper Collins

The blue US jacket is a love letter to the first edition of To Kill a Mockingbird – from the typeface used, to the pictorial style. The name of Harper Lee stands prominent (notice that on the original edition her name is on one line and is much smaller).

Of course there is the “Author of” line across the top, but the entire cover is To Kill a Mockingbird, just 20 years on from the original story’s timeframe. There sits the tree, a little older now, with far fewer leaves and without the beautiful vibrancy of the green. Instead the ones that remain are gold; perhaps Scout returns in autumn, or it’s a suggestion of her age, or of Atticus’s age – he is in his “golden years” after all.

Read Bach’s take in full here. It really is fascinating.

Updated

The announcement of Lee’s new book was not without controversy. Given her statements in the past and the fact she had suffered a stroke a few years ago, there were questions around how much Lee was involved in the decision.

Here is a good read from my colleague Ed Pilkington on some of the furore around it.

The revelation that Go Set a Watchman was unearthed three years before the official account of Lee’s team has suggested, at a meeting attended by the very same lawyer who has herself claimed to make the later discovery, casts the murky story surrounding the book into further obscurity.

When the plan to publish the novel was first announced in February, to the astonishment and jubilation of readers all around the world, local townspeople and friends of the author raised questions about the extent of Lee’s involvement in the decision.

Rebutting the speculation about the author’s personal intentions, and the degree to which the author was able to give informed consent after suffering a stroke several years ago, a statement was released that said Lee was “alive and kicking and happy as hell” with the upcoming book. The statement was made public by Carter.

Read the piece in full here.

Updated

Hello, and welcome to the Guardian’s Go Set a Watchman live blog. We’ll be bringing you commentary, context and reaction to an exclusive sneak preview of Harper Lee’s highly anticipated second novel.

It’s our own online book club, if you will.

In a little less than an hour you’ll be able to read the first chapter on the Guardian site. I’ll post a link as soon as it’s up. No spoilers.

For those wondering what all the fuss is about, here is an early report that Harper Lee would be publishing a second novel, 55 years after To Kill A Mockingbird, and despite vowing she never would.

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Do you ever wake up feeling like you haven’t slept a wink, despite getting a full eight hours? We often blame our busy schedules, our age, or our stress levels for our chronic fatigue. However, the culprit might hide in plain sight within your four walls. A hidden system of…
Budget and the Bees
Budget and the Bees
"He says, 'Everyone knows what ****er means there. You can't show that in England. They'll edit it out.'" A wrestling legend shares how Ozzy Osbourne was "the voice of reason" when he appeared on WWE RAW
Trust Ozzy Osbourne to give American broadcasters a lesson in British swearing
Metal Hammer
Metal Hammer
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