The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (also simply known as Tom Sawyer) is a novel by Mark Twain published on June 9, 1876, about a boy, Tom Sawyer, growing up along the Mississippi River. It is set in the 1830s-1840s in the town of St. Petersburg, which is based on Hannibal, Missouri, where Twain lived as a boy. In the novel, Sawyer has several adventures, often with his friend Huckleberry Finn. Originally a commercial failure, the book ended up being the best-selling of Twain's works during his lifetime.
Along with its 1885 sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the book is considered by many to be a masterpiece of American literature. It was alleged by Mark Twain to be one of the first novels to be written on a typewriter.
Orphan Tom Sawyer (around 12 to 13 years old) lives with his Aunt Polly and his half-brother Sid in the town of St. Petersburg, Missouri, sometime in the 1830s-1840s. He frequently skips school to play or go swimming. When Polly catches him sneaking home late on a Friday evening and discovers that he has been in a fight, she makes him whitewash her fence the next day as punishment.
Tom persuades several neighborhood children to trade him small trinkets and treasures for the "privilege" of doing his work, using reverse psychology to convince them of its enjoyable nature. Later, Tom trades the trinkets with students in his Sunday school class for tickets given out for memorizing verses of Scripture. He collects enough tickets to earn a prized Bible from the teacher, despite being one of the worst students in the class and knowing almost nothing of Scripture, eliciting envy from the students and a mixture of pride and shock from the adults.