For over half a century, To Kill A Mockingbird’s Atticus Finch has been thought of as one of American literature’s great characters, as a man who stood up for what was right in the face of racism. But it turns out that the first version of the character Harper Lee wrote is very, very different.

Go Set A Watchman, which is essentially a rough draft of Mockingbird, will be released to the public on Tuesday. But the first chapter has been published by The Guardian and The Wall Street Journal, while the New York Times has already published their review. The review reveals that when an older Scout returns to her Alabama hometown, she discovers that her own father is not the man she thought.

In the book, Atticus is revealed to be a man who went to a Ku Klux Klan meeting once and is racist. “The Negroes down here are still in their childhood as a people,” he says at one point in the book. In another part, he asks his daughter, “Do you want Negroes by the carload in our schools and churches and theaters? Do you want them in our world?”

Atticus also has a different view of the American justice system, criticizing the Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education decision. He also views the NAACP as opportunists.

Since Atticus is such a beloved literary character, the Times’ review sparked a social media fire, with “Atticus Finch” trending on Twitter last night. The Associated Press notes that publisher HarperCollins even had a statement ready to calm concerns.

“The question of Atticus’s racism is one of the most important and critical elements in this novel, and it should be considered in the context of the book’s broader moral themes,” the publisher said.

Mockingbird was published in 1960 and Watchman was first submitted to publishers in 1957. The “new” book is just Lee’s second published work and writers will be interested in seeing how one of America’s most read stories evolved.

Earlier this week, Amazon said that Watchman is the most pre-ordered book since 2007’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The book has also been translated into seven other languages for Tuesday’s release. Actress Reese Witherspoon narrated the audio version.

cover from HarperCollins