School Library Journal Review
Adult/High School-Shields takes on the elusive writer in this first-ever biography of her. Without direct input from his subject, the author's extensive research combines sources in local-history collections, interviews and correspondence with Lee's acquaintances, and Internet resources to piece together the details of the writer's life. Starting with Lee's childhood in Monroeville, AL, Shields depicts the people and events that inspired To Kill a Mockingbird's characters. A picture develops of a girl who would face down any bully, a nonconformist whose sorority roommates kicked her out after one semester but who made an impact on the campus with her presence, a woman with a wicked sense of humor and a writer with a voice and themes of prejudice and justice that resonate. Students and curious fans alike will find material here to further their understanding of her work and life. Extensive source notes and a student-friendly bibliography are included.-Charlotte Bradshaw, San Mateo County Library, CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Few novels are as beloved and acclaimed as To Kill a Mockingbird and even fewer authors have shunned the spotlight as successfully as its author. Although journalist Shields interviewed 600 of Harper Lee's acquaintances and researched the papers of her childhood friend Truman Capote, he is no match for the elusive Lee, who stopped granting interviews in 1965 and wouldn't talk to him. Much of this first full-length biography of Lee is filled with inconsequential anecdotes focusing on the people around her, while the subject remains stubbornly out of focus. Shields enlivens Lee's childhood by pointing out people who were later fictionalized in her novel. The book percolates during her banner year of 1960, when she won the Pulitzer Prize and helped Capote research In Cold Blood. Capote's papers yield some of Lee's fascinating first-person insights on the emotionally troubled Clutter family that were tempered in his book. Shields believes Lee abandoned her second novel when her agents and her editor-her surrogate family in publishing-died or left the business, leaving her with no support system. There's a tantalizing anecdote about a true-crime project Lee was researching in the mid-'80s that faded away. Sputtering to a close, the final chapter covers the last 35 years in 24 pages. It's also baffling that this affectionate biography ends with three paragraphs devoted to someone slamming her classic work. (June 6) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
A determined but ultimately sketchy summary of the life of Lee, who shuns publicity and avoids biographers. Nelle Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) remains one of the most frequently taught novels in American high schools, and its author remains an impossible bird to lime. For his efforts, which consumed several years, Shields (known principally for his YA titles) has come away with only a few feathers. Virtually all of this biography deals with the years leading up to Lee's Mockingbird (childhood and college and law school) and with its immediate aftermath (the sales, the celebrity, the Pulitzer, the movie). Much of what the author provides for the ensuing 40 years are anecdote and rumor and reports of rare sightings. There are many pages about Lee's collaboration with Truman Capote on In Cold Blood (confirming much of the detail in the film Capote), with some attention to Capote's jealousy of Lee's success and his petty failure to acknowledge the great contributions she made (Shields examined her capacious notes among Capote's papers). Shields has read every piece published about Lee, every interview she granted (some he reproduces at length), but because Lee refused to cooperate (and told her friends to be silent), Shields cannot answer the most fundamental questions that readers and fans have: Why has Harper Lee never published another book? Has she been writing but just not publishing? Lee's mind and heart likewise remain enigmatic. Lee's Cerberus is her older sister Alice (now in her mid-90s), who said years ago that a burglar stole Lee's nearly completed manuscript of her second novel (or, perhaps, a dog ate it). And Lee abandoned a true-crime book that she researched for years. Shields's prose is generally unremarkable--sometimes silly ("The wind blew back her short chestnut hair. . . .") and clichd. Proof that the aging avian continues to elude and frustrate pursuers. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Harper Lee is famous not only for her perennially best-selling first novel, To Kill a Mockingbird0 (1960), but also for never having published a second one and for being relatively reclusive, not having granted interviews since the mid-1960s. Born in Monroeville, Alabama, Lee was a childhood friend of another famous writer, Truman Capote, and their friendship lasted until his death. In fact, Lee accompanied Capote to Kansas and contributed considerable time assisting him in researching the murders that were the basis of his masterpiece, In Cold Blood0 (1966). Lee was always unconventional, never adhering to rules established by, first, her mother, and, then, society. She attended college because she was supposed to, but dropped out and moved to New York to write. Without having heard the words directly from Lee (this book was written without her cooperation), Shields cannot explain exactly why there has never been a second novel, but his estimation of the situation is credible. An informative and genial biography that literary fiction lovers will flock to. --Brad Hooper Copyright 2006 Booklist
Library Journal Review
Former English teacher Shields spent four years researching this biography of the woman behind To Kill a Mockingbird. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.