  the adventures of tom sawyer by mark twain is an 1876 novel about a young boy growing up along the mississippi river. the story is set in the fictional town of st. petersburg, inspired by hannibal, missouri, where twain lived. ==summary== tom sawyer lives with his aunt polly and his half-brother sid. tom dirties his clothes in a fight and is made to whitewash the fence the next day as punishment. he cleverly persuades his friends to trade him small treasures for the privilege of doing his work. he then trades the treasures for sunday school tickets which one normally receives for memorizing verses, redeeming them for a bible, much to the surprise and bewilderment of the superintendent who thought "it was simply preposterous that this boy had warehoused two thousand sheaves of scriptural wisdom on his premisesâa dozen would strain his capacity, without a doubt." tom falls in love with becky thatcher, a new girl in town, and persuades her to get "engaged" by kissing him. but their romance collapses when she learns tom has been "engaged" previously to amy lawrence. shortly after becky shuns him, he accompanies huckleberry finn to the graveyard at night, where they witness the murder of dr. robinson. tom, huck, and joe harper run away to an island. while enjoying their new found freedom, the boys become aware that the community is sounding the river for their bodies. tom sneaks back home one night to observe the commotion. after a brief moment of remorse at his loved ones' suffering, tom is struck by the idea of appearing at his own funeral. back in school, tom gets himself back in becky's favor after he nobly accepts the blame for a book she has ripped. soon, muff potter's trial begins, in which tom testifies against injun joe. p
1876_novels 19th-century_American_novels Adventure_novels American_adventure_novels American_children\'s_novels American_novels_adapted_into_films Novels_by_Mark_Twain Novels_set_in_Missouri Novels_set_in_the_1840s Picaresque_novels Southern_United_States_in_fiction