Dear Great Book Guru,  Last week you wrote about a family touring Ireland and we too will be vacationing there. With all your recommendations, I don’t need any more books on Ireland, but I am interested in the controversial, newly released Harper Lee novel.  What did you think of it and should I download it to bring on our journey?  Curious Reader

Dear Curious Reader,   I feel similarly about GO SET A WATCHMAN by Harper Lee and  Woody Allen’s latest film IRRATIONAL MAN .  Both were so roundly dismissed by critics, I had very low expectations but was happily surprised to find each quite wonderful. Written before TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, this novel is set almost 20 years after with Scout returning to Maycomb as a visiting 26 year-old New Yorker.   While Jean Louise is no longer known as Scout, much of her earlier robust, colorful character remains.  However, she no longer sees her town, her home, and especially her father through the magical prism of childhood.  Instead she finds racism and sexism all around her.   The 1950’s South is an uncomfortable place for  Jean Louise and the reader. Much of the book- while at times offering a nostalgic description of small town life- deals with her horror at discovering things were perhaps never as she remembered.  The title refers to the biblical quotation that demands someone  rise up and become a moral compass; here it is Scout not Atticus who serves as that compass.  Recommended!