Harper Lee, the famously reclusive author of To Kill a Mockingbird, plans to publish a sequel to the American classic.

Harper Lee To Publish Second Book

Lee, 88, penned Go Set A Watchman back in the 1950s – before she sat down to write the novel for which she is known. The book, which comes in at 304 pages, will be Lee’s second published work of fiction. The publisher, HarperCollins, plans a first printing of 2 million copies for Go Set A Watchman.

Tonja Carter, Lee’s lawyer, reportedly found the manuscript at a “secure location where it had been affixed to an original typescript of To Kill a Mockingbird.” Like To Kill a Mockingbird, Go Set a Watchman is set in Maycomb, Ala., but takes place 20 years later in the 1950s.

“Scout (Jean Louise Finch) has returned to Maycomb from New York to visit her father, Atticus,” according to the publisher. “She is forced to grapple with issues both personal and political as she tries to understand her father’s attitude toward society, and her own feelings about the place where she was born and spent her childhood.”

Lee has also released a statement about the new book, expressing her delight that the old manuscript had been unearthed and that the publisher and those close to her felt it was worth printing.

“In the mid-1950s, I completed a novel called Go Set A Watchman,” Lee said in the statement issued by Harper. “It features the character known as Scout as an adult woman, and I thought it a pretty decent effort. My editor, who was taken by the flashbacks to Scout’s childhood, persuaded me to write a novel (what became To Kill a Mockingbird) from the point of view of the young Scout.”

“I was a first-time writer, so I did as I was told. I hadn’t realized it (the original book) had survived, so was surprised and delighted when my dear friend and lawyer Tonja Carter discovered it,” Lee added. “After much thought and hesitation, I shared it with a handful of people I trust and was pleased to hear that they considered it worthy of publication. I am humbled and amazed that this will now be published after all these years.”

Go Set A Watchman is set for a July 14 release.