Go Set a Watchman in Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge

Jul 14, 2015 Rincey rated it liked it

Your fave is problematic.

Full video review: https://youtu.be/_A7pyFVgmW4 ...more

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Jul 14, 2015 Melissa added it

No star rating, since this was never intended as finished product. It's really interesting from a "draft to final product" perspective to see what parts made it into TKAM (which, in all honesty, is maybe 1/3 of GSAW) and Harper Lee could write one hell of a sentence. I can see why the editor at Harper's decided to take this novel and then make Lee rewrite the crap out of it. There's one chapter which I'll just call "The Mechanical Misunderstanding" that was so good - but TKAM's Scout was too you ...more

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Jul 23, 2015 Jenny rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2015

I feel like my review needs to be prefaced with a statement that I think it's crap that because she is very elderly she's being taken advantage of and something she didn't want published was published.

But I bought it and read it and I think it makes me admire her talent all the more. This book is one of the best books I've read this year and it was scrubbed and used to write another book! It has literary merit in its own right and is a really good stand alone book, but reading it as a companion ...more

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Jul 14, 2015 Donna rated it liked it

Shelves: fiction

A good solid 3 stars for the first draft of a masterpiece. I don't think the book ought to have been published, but what luck for us to be able to see how a determined editor can inspire a talented writer to produce her best work.

This is NOT a sequel; it is an early draft of the one book Harper Lee wrote.

Don't reread Mockingbird BEFORE you read this; read it afterward. No, Lee doesn't "get things wrong" in Watchman, she just changed her mind in the writing process and things came out different. ...more

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Jun 21, 2015 Tara rated it liked it

I think utter disappointment is what I feel for this book. My worry is what it will do to Mockingbird, both my own impressions and the book as it stands. How will I teach Mockingbird with Watchman standing over me?

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Jun 30, 2015 Laura Vultaggio rated it did not like it

There were some glimmers of Lee's profound word choice and I actually liked the idea of seeing Atticus as a human being and not as a God, but that is where the praise ends for me.

This novel is disappointing because it is not a novel. It is so clearly an incomplete rough draft of To Kill a Mockingbird. There is no real continuity until the last 40 or so pages. There is a great deal of disjointed dialogue and it would have been nearly impossible to follow if I did not know To Kill a Mockingbird s ...more

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Apr 28, 2015 Bridget rated it liked it

I had mixed emotions when the release of this book was announced. Of course, being a lover of To Kill a Mockingbird, I was excited but I was also optimistically cautious (especially after learning about the legal drama involved).

Anyways, within a few pages I was brought back to a time and place that was easily recognizable. I quickly become emotionally attached again to characters I thought of as old friends and was tearing up within a matter of minutes.

I could see why Lee's editor wanted to k ...more

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Oct 20, 2015 pianogal rated it it was ok

Shelves: z2015-reads, historical-fic

Nope. Sorry. This left me completely flat. It kinda read like bad fan fiction. TKaM had so much depth, and this felt really shallow. Plus, it was basically Scout throwing one big fit. Plus it was like Atticus wasn't racial enough in the first book, so she came back and "fixed" it.

Ugh. No need to care about this one. ...more

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Jul 22, 2015 Kate rated it liked it

Shelves: fiction

While I enjoyed this book, I did not move me to the same level that To Kill A Mockingbird did. I found that Lee's style was not quite a fine tuned in this one. Also, since this was really written first, so major details were different than what we know in TKAM. ...more

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Jul 23, 2017 Sharon rated it liked it

Shelves: southern, fiction

The manuscript sat for years before being published and then the finished novel sat on my shelf for another two before I was ready to read it. Not sure why I was so afraid, but I needed to part from the hype, the expectations, and the criticism. Still, the adult Scout as Jean Louise resonated with me: "I just don't like my world disturbed without some warning" she said (p. 75). Of course; most of us don't wish to see the ones we love change from the way we know and love them because that is why ...more

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