The Help

The Help
Author: Kathryn Stockett

Description: Southern whites' guilt for not expressing gratitude to the black maids who raised them threatens to become a familiar refrain. But don't tell Kathryn Stockett because her first novel is a nuanced variation on the theme that strikes every note with authenticity. In a page-turner that brings new resonance to the moral issues involved, she spins a story of social awakening as seen from both sides of the American racial divide.

From Me: I was scared and excited to pick up this book. Every time such a hype is made over a book I end up disappointed-but not this time. This is a beautifully written book, it held my attention from the first page to the last, and I would have read on another 300 pages if the author had allowed it.

The book is placed in 1960's Jackson, Mississippi. The Civil Rights movement is just underway and its currents are reaching Jackson faster and faster. Each chapter has a different narrator, t ...more I was scared and excited to pick up this book. Every time such a hype is made over a book I end up disappointed-but not this time. This is a beautifully written book, it held my attention from the first page to the last, and I would have read on another 300 pages if the author had allowed it.

The book is placed in 1960's Jackson, Mississippi. The Civil Rights movement is just underway and its currents are reaching Jackson faster and faster. Each chapter has a different narrator, typically one of the maids. The story focuses on the lives of several black maids and their experience waiting on white families. The story is much deeper than that, though. The story deals with love, loss, anger, frustration, courage, fear, hate, parent-child relationships, the strong, the weak, and of course, the crazy.

One of the many main characters, Miss Skeeter, is a young unmarried white woman. Her mother desparately wants her to get married, she is constantly shocked by her bridge club's racist comments, and is on a mission to become and writer and to find out the truth about her childhood maid, Constantine's leaving.

The other most significant character is Abeline, a black maid. The story begins and ends with her journey. We find out quickly she is a praying woman, the she lost her son when he was 24, and that she feels lost to the world after losing her son. She and Miss Skeeter join up to create a dialogue exposing the maid-family relationship in Jackson.

I could go on and on about the characters, but it is best to just read the book. At the very least it is a moving story with many curiousities.