The release of Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee is set to be
the biggest event of the decade in the literary world, and as a bookseller, I’m
feeling the anticipation. There are posters and displays all over the shop,
constant requests for pre-orders and a nice sense of fuzzy nostalgia for To Kill a Mockingbird. I’m excited, and yesterday I expressed this to a colleague.
Big mistake.
He blurted out two spoilers. TWO. One was a heart-breaking elaboration
on a tidbit that had already been revealed by a naughty Guardian tweet, the
other was unrelated to the first but equally soul-destroying.
I made a big fuss. I shouted, backed away, covered my ears
(all in public and unashamed), but it was too late. It was like I’d been
punched in the chest. Or the heart.
Colleague asked “Haven’t you read the first chapter yet?”
It’s true, I’ve had the chance to read the first chapter, it
was published by The Guardian 3 days ago online, and we were even selling
copies of the paper containing the chapter in store. I had thought about it but
ultimately decided that I would rather have the option of reading as much as
the book as I wanted to after the official publication date.
Apparently these spoilers were “only from the first chapter”,
so at least I have the rest of the book to discover for myself, but the
question is this: how long must you tip-toe around others to avoid spoiling? I
had three days to avoid this situation, was that enough?
I found myself in a similar situation during the hype
leading up the release of Mad About the Boy by Helen Fielding. The third
Bridget Jones book started with a pretty significant death, which I let slip to
a customer and had to recover quickly by telling her that she would have found
out herself on the second or third page (slight exaggeration). This had been
revealed in reviews, blogs and newspaper articles everywhere, I couldn’t
believe she didn’t already know, but nevertheless, I felt awful to have been
the one to break the news.
I took my time reading Harry Potter and the Order of the
Phoenix and paid the price by having a certain death revealed by a friend when
I was just pages away from finding out by myself. I beat her half to death with
my school-bag. She never spoiled again. I read Harry Potter and the Half-Blood
Prince as fast as I could. I locked myself in my room and hissed at anyone who
attempted contact. Nothing was ruined, but to this day it’s the only book in
the series that I can hardly remember. By the time Harry Potter and the Deathly
Hallows came out I was mature enough to tell everyone I was taking my time, but
not mature enough to follow through. I read it over one week, during which my
boyfriend (at the time) texted me the name of almost every victim just a few
chapters ahead of where I was up to, because “you’d have seen it coming anyway”.
He wasn’t even that into Harry Potter (or so he said).
When my current (non-spoiling) boyfriend started the Game of
Thrones series a few weeks after the release of A Dance With Dragons, I thought
he was in for a life-time of publication day speed-reading (albeit once every
six years…), but it seems that the Game of Thrones readers are respectful of
one another. The audience of the Game of Thrones television series is another
matter entirely. If you are not watching the original live broadcasting, they,
not unlike the characters, have no sympathy.
On the subject of film and TV, I have another colleague who
does not consider it spoiling if the film has finished its run in the cinema,
or if the show was broadcast on television more than a week ago. Or something
like that. Just be careful around that guy.
I'm all for speed-reading if I just cannot wait to find out what happens next in a series. It's something I have experienced with many a young-adult series, where every novel ends with a cliff-hanger or an unexpected love-triangle. For me this is not the case with the Mockingbird sequel. This is one I will be approaching with caution and intrigue. The story of the author and the controversy behind the latest publication is fascinating in itself.
So I need to decide if I am going to speed-read or take my
time with Go Set a Watchman. On the one hand I could get through the remainder
of the book without knowing anything before the time is right. On the other
hand I can take my time, read when I’m in the mood, set the scene, light the
candles, the whole shebang. I’m more likely to enjoy it, I’m more likely to
remember it, but will anything be a surprise?
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