To_Kill_a_Mockingbird
Harper Lee's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, 'To Kill a Mockingbird.' Harper Collins

Pulitzer Prize winner Harper Lee famously published just one book, "To Kill a Mockingbird" in 1960. Now, there will be another, "Go Set a Watchman," which she finished in the 1950s and never published.

The lost book, rediscovered last fall, will be released by publisher Harper July 14. It's a sequel to "To Kill a Mockingbird" and features "Scout" as an adult woman, but it was finished earlier.

"In the mid-1950s, I completed a novel called 'Go Set a Watchman," the 88-year-old Lee said in a statement. "It features a 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. 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."

The book is set in Maycomb, Alabama 20 years after "To Kill a Mockingbird."

"Scout (Jean Louise Finch) has returned to Maycomb from New York to visit her father, Atticus," the publisher's announcement reads. "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 grew up and still lives in Monroeville, Alabama. The courthouse, where the key scenes of the book and the 1962 movie with Gregory Peck took place, still stands. The town recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of the publication of the book.

Financial terms were not disclosed. Harper plans a print run of 2 million; 'To Kill a Mockingbird' has sold over 40 million copies over the past 54 years.