The Mockingbird Next Door: Life with Harper Lee

Interesting book and perspective but made me not like Nelle Harper so much...she had so many gifts...too bad she was so reticent to share them with everyone who admired her and loved her To Kill a Mockingbird....which was very much an autobiography in my opinion.

This is a wonderful book. I see nothing disrespectful in it. It is a loving tribute to two wonderful ladies, and a look into the life of Harper Lee. She comes across as a delightful and very human person. I understand why miss Ms. Lee would see the things she is saying, but I don't think Marja Mills did anything but show her love and respect for Ms. Lee.

I enjoyed Ms. Mills account of the time spent with the Lee sisters. "To Kill a Mockingbird" is my favorite book of all times. Ms. Mills gave me a very good insight into the everyday lives of Harper Lee and her sister Alice. The book was refreshing, easy to read, and a wonderful insight into the lives of two very smart and loving sisters. I highly recommend anyone interested in Harper Lee.

What a great book, I have bought other copies for family and friends, I could not put it down. I was amazed at all I didn't know about Harper Lee AND To Kill A Mockingbird. If you enjoyed the classic, you will enjoy the time spent with the reclusive author.

Very good book. Love learning the history and life of others growing up back then. Hearing the stories and just how she lived without all the lime light and still lived the simple life. Appreciating the small things and what really matters, family, and friends, being proud of where you came from and keeping the history alive. Plan on buying the sequel of To Kill A Mocking Bird, Have enjoyed the story growing up and enjoyed the movie, still watch it.

I thourghly enjoyed this book. It made me feel like I was living next door to Harper Lee. But then, I was so dismayed to read that Miss Lee said that this is NOT an authorized book. Having said that, the book felt real and I would recommend it for anyone who loves To Kill a Mockinbird.

An absolutely charming and delightful book. Like millions of others, To Kill a Mockingbird is my favorite book and movie. It was nice to read about Nelle Harper Lee and her sister, Alice, and find out that they have a great sense of humor. So sad to know that Harper had a stroke.
Thank you Marja Mills for giving us an inside look at my favorite author.

An interesting and true account of the author's friendship with the Lee's who were known to avoid publicity but were somehow attracted to Mill's personality enough to become her friends. So the factual stories of their personalities were interesting.

This story unfolds as the reader becomes involved with this author, Marja Mills, in her journey to Monroeville, Alabama. She spends several years of research and interviews with Harper Lee, the author of To Kill A Mockingbird, her sister Nelle, and townspeople. During this time, she ends up moving next door to the sisters.
Ms Mills befriends and becomes almost like family. This is her story.

Harper Lee did not give interviews and only wrote one book alone. she remains a rather enigmatic woman.

She opened her world to Mark a who shares that world with us in a fascinating manner.

This is well worth reading. And rereading.

missed the mark a bit. No deep insights into Nelle Harper Lee, the person, alas. Harper Lee was a courageous woman who wrote about the inequality of the South in a time when it was dangerous to do so. Wanted to see more of the person who would dare to do this.

This book gives you a sense of a particular group of people, but it gives very little new information or insight into the most famous member of the group. Mills get to live the dream of many journalists, to get deeply into the life of a person of renown. But what she fails to realize, probably because she has gotten too close to Harper Lee, is that there isn't really much there that is unique or worthy of a book.

The great insights into the life of Harper Lee that Mills spends years discovering is that she is very protective of her family, she loves words and word play, she is politically liberal, and she loves to drive around the countryside and stop for treats along the way. Not exactly an unusual personality, and yet Mills clings to the idea that Harper Lee is unique. The alternative is that Harper Lee is unique but that Mills simply couldn't capture her personality.

With every page that I turned I kept expecting the Great Reveal. The trait that made Harper Lee special. It doesn't happen. I also kept expecting some great stories since the Southern women I knew were very entertaining storytellers. I think the stories that were told in the car and at the dinner table were entertaining, but Mills doesn't seem to have an ability to recreate a scene or a story to make us happy to have read it.

Mils' hook is that she spent months living next door to Nelle (Harper) and Alice Lee. It is a great hook but results in a very tiny catch.

missed the mark a bit. No deep insights into Nelle Harper Lee, the person, alas. Harper Lee was a courageous woman who wrote about the inequality of the South in a time when it was dangerous to do so. Wanted to see more of the person who would dare to do this.

This book gives you a sense of a particular group of people, but it gives very little new information or insight into the most famous member of the group. Mills get to live the dream of many journalists, to get deeply into the life of a person of renown. But what she fails to realize, probably because she has gotten too close to Harper Lee, is that there isn't really much there that is unique or worthy of a book.

The great insights into the life of Harper Lee that Mills spends years discovering is that she is very protective of her family, she loves words and word play, she is politically liberal, and she loves to drive around the countryside and stop for treats along the way. Not exactly an unusual personality, and yet Mills clings to the idea that Harper Lee is unique. The alternative is that Harper Lee is unique but that Mills simply couldn't capture her personality.

With every page that I turned I kept expecting the Great Reveal. The trait that made Harper Lee special. It doesn't happen. I also kept expecting some great stories since the Southern women I knew were very entertaining storytellers. I think the stories that were told in the car and at the dinner table were entertaining, but Mills doesn't seem to have an ability to recreate a scene or a story to make us happy to have read it.

Mils' hook is that she spent months living next door to Nelle (Harper) and Alice Lee. It is a great hook but results in a very tiny catch.

Interesting story. I have read that Harper Lee felt her sister had been taken in by the author and felt that the author had taken liberties with this story. I wonder if Harper Lee's illness and ending up in a nursing facility has something to do with her opinions on this book

This is an interesting book and I enjoy the accounts of the daily life but I'm not sure it's to the authors credit that Lee claims there was no permission given to write the book. Still, the daily life of Harper Lee and her neighbors sounds pretty much like mine.

Interesting read. Learned a lot about Harper Lee and her history. Story got a little confusing with the author jumping back and forth from the past to the present. Worth the read if you want insight into Harper Lee.

I started this book with high expectations for learning something about Harper Lee. Instead, I learned a few things about the author (which had no bearing on the larger narrative about Lee) and the most mundane anecdotes about the lives of Lee and her elder sister. I don't know how any editor could've thought that an audience hungry to know more about Lee would be satisfied to read that she enjoys watching football and has a stack of books on her bedside table. This book is a huge disappointing, exploitative dud.

beautifully written book! Loved the story line about Harper Lee, her sister and community, could not put it down and was actually sad when I read the last page, because there was no more. A book to be read again.

Miss Mills gives us an interesting look into the life of Harper Lee. Lee is truly a one-of-a-kind individual and I stress individual. I find the author of TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD as interesting as her story and Miss Mills makes this apparent.

Very interesting background and biography of Nelle Harper Lee. If you like the book or movie To Kill a Mocking Bird, you'll love this book. It gives a lot of insight into the book characters and their connection to the people in the life of the author.

This was a perfectly delightful book written beautifully. I felt I knew Harper Lee by the end. How wonderful for Marja Mills to have had such a wonderful friendship with the author of a book that still resonates with readers generation after generation.

To Kill A Mockingbird is my favorite book and this book gave a genuine glance in the life of the author, Harper Lee.
The reader also experiences the culture of her small town Alabama home, Monroeville.

If you have read 'To Kill A Mockingbird' and have ever been curious about Nelle Harper Lee, this is the book for you. It is written in a very loving way by a Chicago journalist who formed a long friendship with both Alice and Nelle.

Any Southerner and disciple of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird will be riveted by this one- and- only authorized biography of Ms. Lee. And I really do believe that the author had the full cooperation of both Ms. Lee and her sister. We all know how crotchety Harper Lee presented herself, and we all know that she is in very poor health, as is her sister, so I do not believe for one moment that she did not authorize this book.
And I do not care one whit whether Harper Lee was gay or not - all I know is that she wrote a magnificent book - a classic and that is what I want to remember her for.

A wonderful look at the personal life of Nelle Harper Lee and her friends and family that shaped her life. Her Southern upbringing and small town life shines through on the pages of her novel To Kill a Mockingbird and an explanation of why she never wrote another novel is finally offered. An engaging book from beginning to end. Kudos to Marja Mills for sharing the story of the Lee family and one of my favorite authors, Harper Lee.

I really liked this book. Ordered it on Kindle and then purchased the hard cover. If you want reflection, quiet and to slow down the pace then follow Marja Mills with her travelling companions, Harper and Alice Lee, through Monroe and adjacent counties in Alabama. Thank you Marja Mills for bringing us closer to the private life of Harper Lee -- The Mockingbird Next Door. This opportunity would not have come otherwise.

Beautifully Written. A wonderful insight to Harper Lee, her sister, and Monroeville, the roots of To Kill A Mockingbook. By the middle of the book, I was ready to take a jaunt to Alabama and have coffee with the group. Thanks, Marja for the insight into Harper Lee and why she covets privacy.

Very interesting story about Harper Lee's life. How an author of a classic story lives a life of simplicity and privacy. Loved all of the characters and the stories that surround them and their daily lives.

Good read with insight into a simple way of life. Harper and her sister Alice live a quiet and fulfilling life in the south, where time moves slower and the joys in life are found in a steady stream of everyday activities.

Loved reading this book. It gave me a good understanding of the Lee sisters. I appreciate knowing that Harper Lee was a person just like the rest of us. I especially liked knowing that she had this beautiful talent that she failed to make the most of (even though she won a Pulitzer) like so many of us do. We are all clay vessels after all. Even the great ones.

An inside look at the real Nell Harper Lee. Fascinating, truthful , and a rare insight . She clears up ,
many questions you wondered about and really takes you home with Lee sisters and their lives.

I have often wondered about the life of Harper Lee. All my questions were answered in this book about her I loved hearing about her neighbors, her relatives, her father, her sisters and brothers and how they affected her writing.

It was very interesting to know how Lee Harper and Alice lived. They had a few close friends and coming and going back to New York where Nelle like to be free of stress of people hounding her as an author of To Kill a Mocking bird! She did not want to be public, wanted her life undisturbed...I am sad she never wrote again as she had such good feeling of people and situations...tell the truth and not made up situations...everyone has a story...She, Marja was gentle with Nelle and honest giving us an insight of her life. Jone Hoffman

Expect no revelations. Harper Lee appears to live the very ordinary life of an aristocratic Southern lady -- one of modesty and service to others and her community. The gift of this book is that in reading it you learn about the tension inherent in tying to live an ordinary life while also being a living legend. Harper Lee has been called "reclusive," but when you read about her regular public appearances (she appears to be honored often) and her frequent interaction with people in the world, you see that she isn't reclusive at all, she's just not Truman Capote.

The book's drawback is its style. Ms. Mills is a journalist by training and profession, and her writing reflects these two facts. The prose is flat, and frankly, boring. This is not a writer who loves language or has any sense of literature or literary history (as she freely admits in this book).

A very well written book--most interesting. I could picture the landscape, the people and their activities as I read. There was so much background information on all their lives, I just felt as if I knew them personally--even Ms. Mills.