The Help by Kathryn Stockett
Women's Fiction, Southern Fiction
The year is 1962 and the place is Jackson, Mississippi.
When Skeeter returns home after graduating from Ole Miss, she believes her life will be different. She has a degree now, and thinks getting a serious writing job will be easy. However, she is a young woman and lacks a little something called experience. And experience is something that is hard to get in a town like Jackson. Not only so, but her mother won't be happy until Skeeter has a ring on her finger. While fending off her mother, Skeeter writes the newsletter for the Junior League, and gets a job writing a house keeping column in the Jackson Journal. Knowing nothing about house keeping herself, Skeeter asks her friend Elizabeth if she can talk to her maid, Aibileen. Normally she would have turned to her own maid, Constantine, but she seems to have disappeared while Skeeter was away and no one will tell her what happened.
Aibileen is a strong and wise black maid in her fifties. Since her son died a year ago, bitterness has crept into her heart and clouded the way she views things. She is raising her seventeenth white child while her own son is dead in the ground. Although she loves the little child, Mae Mobley, she is no longer able to be naive to the ways of the world. Although the children love her when they are young, they all grow up to be like their parents--in their ignorance, mistreating black people. This time, Aibileen hopes, she can instill proper values in this little girl--show her that she is loved, and that the colour of your skin doesn't matter.
Minny is Aibileen's best friend. She is short and stout, and very sassy. Although her mama told her to hold her tongue and not sass the white ladies, Minny has never been able to grasp this and has lost many a job because of it. Out of a job again, Minny finds her self working for someone new to town who does not know about her reputation. This woman is different from the rest--in more ways than one.
These three women are brought together by a secret project that puts them all in jeopardy. Things need to change, and these women won't stand for it anymore. As they get to know one another, Skeeter learns how naive she has been, and the maids begin to allow themselves to hope. Together these women push boundaries and don't let imaginary lines in the sand stop their friendship.
I have four words for you: this book is amazing.
I loved it!
I didn't really getting into the craze two years ago when the movie came out. I remember how everyone was obsessing over it. They would tell me how they saw the movie multiple times, and I would see countless people floating around with copies of the book in their hands. I was interested, but I am often turned off when everyone makes a hug fuss over something. When the movie came out on DVD I rented it and watched it. It was pretty enjoyable, but I wasn't about to go crazy over it.
Last week I was trying to decide what to read and I thought, hey, maybe I will finally give The Help a try. I borrowed the ebook from the library and just devoured it. It was so good! I often found myself staying up into the wee hours reading until I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer.
It's really interesting as well how the author herself is from Jackson, Mississippi. She is something of a Skeeter character, and grew up in a home there with a black maid raising her. At the time, she didn't notice the divisions or the differences in treatment. However, looking back, she could see the truth. She drew on her experience and research to create The Help as sort of her apology and her thank-you.
I highly recommend this book.
Labels: A, Historical, Review, Southern Fiction, Women's Fiction