The writer Harper Lee, who died this week, has been herself written about as much as any American writer in the last 75 years.
Her seminal novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, about justice, race and class in the pre-civil rights south, has been beloved since it was published in 1960. Until a sequel, Go Set a Watchman, was released 55 years later, it was the only book Lee ever wrote.
Lee stopped giving interviews years ago and her life since then has been the source of much speculation.
Madison-born Marja Mills' book, The Mockingbird Next Door, chronicles the time she spent living in the house next to Lee and her older sister Alice.
Back in 2014, Lake Effect's Bonnie North interviewed Mills about this.
“There was such an easy, natural rapport there," says Mills. "[Lee] was so delightful from the start, and I think that’s a good part of the reason that I got a call in my motel room one day from this husky voice saying, ‘This is Harper Lee, I wonder if we might meet’”.
The book has elicited some controversy since its publication, mostly about the level of cooperation Harper Lee actually gave. But the book’s story isn’t being challenged.
