55 years after ‘Mockingbird’, Harper Lee to release sequel

NEW YORK: “To Kill a Mockingbird” will not be Harper Lee’s only published book after all.
Publisher Harper announced Tuesday that “Go Set a Watchman,” a novel the Pulitzer Prize-winning author completed in the 1950s and put aside, will be released July 14. Rediscovered last fall, “Go Set a Watchman” is essentially a sequel to “To Kill a Mockingbird,” although it was finished earlier.
Reactions ranged from euphoria (Oprah Winfrey issued a statement saying, “I couldn’t be happier if my name was Scout“) to skepticism about Lee’s cooperation and about the quality of the new book. Biographer Charles J. Shields noted that Lee was a “beginning author” when she wrote “Watchman.”
The 304-page book will be Lee’s second, and her first new work in print in more than 50 years, among the longest gaps in history for a major writer.
“In the mid-1950s, I completed a novel called ‘Go Set a Watchman,’” the 88-year-old Lee said in a statement issued by Harper. “It features the character known as Scout as an adult woman, and I thought it a pretty decent effort. My editor, who was taken by the flashbacks to Scout’s childhood, persuaded me to write a novel (what became ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’) from the point of view of the young Scout.
“I was a first-time writer, so I did as I was told. I hadn’t realized it (the original book) had survived, so was surprised and delighted when my dear friend and lawyer Tonja Carter discovered it. After much thought and hesitation, I shared it with a handful of people I trust and was pleased to hear that they considered it worthy of publication. I am humbled and amazed that this will now be published after all these years.”
Financial terms were not disclosed. The deal was negotiated between Carter and the head of Harper’s parent company, Michael Morrison of HarperCollins Publishers. “Watchman” will be published in the United Kingdom by William Heinemann, an imprint of Penguin Random House.
Lee lives in an assisted living center in her hometown of Monroeville, the real-life model for the fictional town of Maycomb of “To Kill A Mockingbird.” A longtime friend said she is deaf, blind and in poor health, spending much of her time in a wheelchair. She was last seen publicly in November at the funeral of her older sister, Alice Lee, who long represented the author and was known for being protective of her.
Harper publisher Jonathan Burnham acknowledged Tuesday that the publisher had had no direct conversations with Harper Lee, but communicated through Carter and literary agent Andrew Nurnburg.
Burnham said during a telephone interview that he had known both Carter and Nurnburg for years and was “completely confident” Lee was fully involved in the decision to release the book.
“We’ve had a great deal of communication with Andrew and Tonja,” said Burnham, adding that Nurnburg had met with her recently and found her “feisty and in very fine spirits.”
Jillian Schultz, who operates a gift and home shop on Monroeville’s town square, said she has read “Mockingbird” about 20 times and looks forward to the sequel.
But, like others, Schultz has questions about the long delay between the publications.
“I was really surprised,” said Schultz, 28. “You know there’s a lot of controversy about whether Harper Lee actually wrote the (first) book. There’s been so many years in between, and you have to wonder, ‘How did somebody forget about a book?’”
According to publisher Harper, Carter came upon the manuscript at a “secure location where it had been affixed to an original typescript of ‘To Kill a Mockingbird.’”
By Tuesday afternoon, “Watchman” was in the top 10 on barnesandnoble.com, representing a flood of preorders in just a few hours. The publisher plans a first printing of 2 million copies, on a par with a novel by John Grisham or Stephen King but fewer than were printed for later books in the Harry Potter series.