The unforgettable novel of a childhood in a sleepy Southern town and the crisis of conscience that rocked it, To Kill A Mockingbird became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film, also a classic.


Compassionate, dramatic, and deeply moving, To Kill A Mockingbird takes readers to the roots of human behavior - to innocence and experience, kindness and cruelty, love and hatred, humor and pathos. Now with over 18 million copies in print and translated into forty languages, this regional story by a young Alabama woman claims universal appeal. Harper Lee always considered her book to be a simple love story. Today it is regarded as a masterpiece of American literature.

"Marvelous . . . Miss Lee's original characters are people to cherish in this winning first novel."—The New York Times

"Remarkable triumph . . . Miss Lee writes with a wry compassion that makes her novel soar."—Life magazine

"Miss Lee wonderfully builds the tranquil atmosphere of her Southern town, and as adroitly causes it to erupt a shocking lava of emotions."—San Francisco Examiner

"Skilled, unpretentious and tototally ingenuous . . . tough, melodramatic, acute, funny."—The New Yorker

"A novel of great sweetness, humor, compassion, and of mystery carefully sustained."—Harper's Magazine