THE FIRST NINE PEOPLE TO READ GO SET A WATCHMAN

Kept under lock and key until it was published this past Tuesday, only a select few had read the new, divisively received novel in advance of publication, but they’re hard to find and sworn to secrecy. Rebecca Tucker reports on the people who were the fir

Tay Hohoff,

formerly an editor for the now defunct publishing house, J.B. She was the editor who, after reading Watchman, convinced Lee to rework the book into To Kill a Mockingbird. In the statement that accompanied the announcement of Watchman’s publication, Lee says, “In the mid-1950s, I completed a novel called Go Set a Watchman. 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 from the point of view of the young Scout.”

Reese Witherspoon,

who has actually read Watchman aloud: the Louisiana-born actress recorded the audio version of the book. “It shocked me,” Witherspoon told Katie Couric earlier this week, “being a modern woman in 2015, reading some of the words. I had to keep reminding myself it was written in the ’50s, and these were the complex issues that people ... were dealing with.”

Alice Lee,

Harper Lee’s older sister, and the woman acting as the author’s conservator and guardian until her death in 2014. It was Alice Lee who placed the manuscript for Go Set A Watchman in the safety deposit box where it was discovered (whenever it was discovered, and by whoever discovered it).

Robert Thompson

is the CEO of News Corp., which is the parent company of Watchman’s publisher, HarperCollins, so it’s unsurprising that he’s one of the lucky few to have read the book thus far. He confirmed having read the book over a month ago, telling a news conference in London that it is “a fascinating, captivating, important book.”

Mary Murphy,

a filmmaker whose 2010 documentary about Lee, titled Harper Lee: Hey, Boo, aired on PBS on July 10 to commemorate the release of Watchman. Murphy did not respond to our requests for comment, but confirmed having read the book in an interview Friday with The Journal News. “I can’t yet share my thoughts about the book,” she said, “but I think anyone who wants to know about (the characters) is going to be delighted.”

Tonja Carter,

a partner in the law firm Barnett, Bugg, Lee & Carter — the firm formerly run by Harper Lee’s father, and which employed her sister, Alice — since 2007, and has been Harper Lee’s durable power of attorney (a designation often given to lawyers who work with the elderly) since 2012.

Justin Caldwell,

a Sotheby’s rare book expert who travelled to Monroeville, Alabama in October, 2011, to evaluate and verify an early draft of To Kill a Mockingbird for insurance purposes. The draft Caldwell saw is thought to be, in fact, the manuscript that has been now published as Go Set a Watchman.

Samuel Pinkus,

Lee’s literary agent, whom Lee famously sued in 2013 for being shady about copyrights (see our controversy timeline, beginning at the top of this page.)

Terry Finley,

the CEO of retailer Books-A-Million, which is headquartered in Alabama, and a friend of Charles Shields, Harper Lee’s unauthorized biographer. Finley confirmed in an email to the Post that he has read Watchman, but declined to comment further, saying he has “promised the publisher that I wouldn’t comment until publication day.”