Artist Amy Lyons’s painting depicting a scene from Betty Smith’s iconic book “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” is unveiled at Leonard Public Library on Wednesday in Brooklyn.

In the morning, she decided to go down for a newspaper herself, ... Betty Smith’s book was immediately a Literary Guild selection, and it sold 300,000 copies in six weeks.

Betty Smith’s second novel, “Tomorrow Will Be Better” fell by the wayside. A new edition gives it another chance.