For almost exactly 55 years, To Kill a Mockingbird was the only book by Harper Lee. No one ever imagined going to Shmoop, looking at the page for To Kill a Mockingbird, and seeing it as the first book in a series.

Sure, it's just a series of two (for now), but it's a series.

If you were born after 1960, Go Set a Watchman is one of the biggest literary events of your life. No exaggeration. There will never be anything else like this. This book is to literature what Citizen Kane 2 would be to movies, or Half-Life 3 to videogames.

Whatever you think of Go Set a Watchman as a novel, there is no arguing that this book is one of the most important literary historical documents of the last century. It provides raw insight into the mind behind To Kill a Mockingbird. Getting to read this is like an architect getting to see blueprints for the Parthenon.

And whatever you think of To Kill a Mockingbird, you have to read Go Set A Watchman. If you love it, it provides an unprecedented look into the mind of the reclusive author. If you hate it, its content might help you prove to your friends that Mockingbird should no longer be considered a great American classic.

It also revives another conspiracy theory: the one that says Lee's childhood friend Truman Capote actually wrote Mockingbird. It's doubtful, unless Truman Capote actually killed Harper Lee in 1984—in cold blood, badoom-ching—and had been pretending to be her ever since, and this publication is his final vindication before his own demise. (Okay, we made that last part up, but think about it. That would be true Southern Gothic.)

To sum up all the bonkers nuttiness surrounding this book, Go Set a Watchman is like the Ark of the Covenant for American Lit nerds. You have to open the thing, even if it's going to burn your face off. Your level of face-meltage will vary depending on how much you revere Atticus Finch. If you've regarded him as a hero ever since your first reading of To Kill a Mockingbird, you best keep a towel and a fire extinguisher handy.

No mockingbirds died during the writing of this book, but many childhood dreams might die during the reading of it.