BOOK - "TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD" by HARPER LEE

I'm probably the only person who just read this book for the first time - but I DID see the movie - several times. 

I loved the book. What controversial topics the author presented and worked through, in a very open and forward style.  Written from the perspective of a young white girl, Scout, made it an even more interesting read.  The ending had me thinking and questioning for a few minutes, which I liked too. 

Some excerpts that I enjoyed:

Pg. 39

     "Jem, you reckon that's somebody's hidin' place?"

     "Naw, don't anybody much but us pass by there, unless it's some grown person's - "

     "Grown folks don't have hidin' places. You reckon we ought to keep 'em, Jem?"

Pg. 45

     I was not so sure, but Jem told me I was being a girl, that girls asways imagined things, that's why other people hated them so, and if I started behaving like one I could just go off and find some to play with.

Pg. 103

     Atticus said to Jem one day,  "I'd rather you shot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you'll go after birds.  Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."

     That was the only time I ever heard Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it.

     "Your father's right, " she said. "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."

Pg. 112

     "Looks like he'd be proud of it," I said.

     "People in their right minds never take pride in their talents," said Miss Maudie.

Pg. 114

     Jem and I hated her. If she was on the porch when we passed, we would be raked by her wrathful gaze, subjected to ruthless interrogation regarding our behavior, and given a melancholy prediction on what we would amount to when we grew up, which was always nothing. We had long ago given up the idea of walking past her house on the opposite side of the street: that only made her raise her voice and let the whole neighborhood in on it.

Pg. 146

     I said I would like it very much, which was a lie, but one must lie under certain circumstances and at all times when one can't do anything about them.

Pg. 245

     "I simply want to tell you that there are some men in this world who were born to do our unpleasant jobs for us.  Your father's one of them."

Joan