On the Overt Sketchiness of That New Book By Harper Lee

• HarperCollins
• CALL ME CRAZY, but perhaps this book is enough.

If you read books at all, you may have been freaking out or donning your skepticism hat yesterday over the announcement that Harper Lee, longtime middle school English staple, first-time second-novel writer was publishing a follow-up to 1960’s To Kill a Mockingbird. Let’s get this out of the way: I’m on Team Skepticism Hat, because since the announcement came out, I’ve only seen one quote attributed to Lee herself crop up—it’s effusive and comes from a press release from HarperCollins. This is to say nothing of the fact that Lee has been in ill health since having a stroke in 2007, and has for decades shown discomfort with her fame and showed little interest in continuing to publish. There’s also the strange interview at Vulture with her US editor, who apparently knew nothing about the book as late as Monday of this week. Plus this sketchy detail from Jezebel:

Tonja Carter, Harper Lee’s attorney since Alice Lee retired at the age of 100, acknowledges that the author—who was left forgetful and nearly blind and deaf after a stroke in 2007—often doesn’t understand the contracts that she signs. “Lee has a history of signing whatever’s put in front of her, apparently sometimes with Carter’s advice,” Gawker’s Michelle Dean reported last July.

Many have weighed in on this with smart dissections, but as always, I agree with the Toast’s Mallory Ortberg on this, who writes of Vulture’s interview:

Look, fair enough that being Harper Lee’s editor today just involves “I met her at a party once nine years ago.” But this feels like one of those nights where you and a bunch of friends from college who all live in different parts of town are trying to coordinate last-minute and everyone’s texts are getting more and more confusing. “I thought Katie was picking you up?” “No, I’ve been waiting for you outside the library for like ten minutes?” “Why did you think I was driving?” “Guys, did anyone even invite Katie?” And meanwhile Katie’s already at the restaurant, but it’s the first place, not the actually one you guys decided to go to because Anna went to a great Ecuadorian place last week that she really wants to show you, and you’re all going to get a series of increasingly angry and confused messages from Katie at around 8:15.

Yeah, some things just aren’t worth it. Sometimes it’s better to just stay home.