To Kill a Mockingbird: A Graphic Novel

Fred Fordham's new graphic adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird faithfully recreates Harper Lee's original in a format that brings the magic back to this classic.

In this new adaptation of Lee's classic, Fordham's use of a limited color palette creates a vintage feel to his artwork. And while the print is on the small size and on a few pages the panels feel crowded, using a standard size hardcover format makes the book easy to hold whether you're a child or an adult reading aloud to children—or for your own pleasure.

Despite missing the longer passages of description and commentary found in the original—the bits that children tend to skip anyway—the heart of Lee's fictional 1933 Maycomb is faithfully recreated via the art and dialogue. In fact, this edition of To Kill a Mockingbird is maybe even a bit more heartbreaking than the original as the focus is more on the children with little distraction, casting the brutality of the circumstances that force Scout's journey from innocence to worldly into stark relief.

The economic and racial disparities, the blinders that "civilized" society stubbornly clings to, the realization that justice for all can never exist without equality for all—these are vividly portrayed not only via Lee's words but also by Fordham's art, making this graphic adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird a worthy partner to the original, providing a clarion call for civility, equality, and justice for all.