The Help by Kathryn Stockett

Be prepared to meet three unforgettable women:
Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.
Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her seventeenth white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.
Minny, Aibileen's best friend, is short, fat, and perhaps the sassiest woman in Mississippi. She can cook like nobody's business, but she can't mind her tongue, so she's lost yet another job. Minny finally finds a position working for someone too new to town to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own.
Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.

I am jumping on the bandwagon of praise for this book. It really is sensational.

The Help details the lives of three women in Jackson, MS in the 1960's, during the height of the Civil Rights Movement. There is Skeeter, a well off, young, white woman who aspires to be a writer and has always seen things a bit differently. Aibileen is an experienced and intelligent black maid who is currently raising her 17th white child. And then there is Minny, a feisty black woman who has no problem speaking her mind and putting her employment at risk regularly. Together they work together, secretly, to put together a book that will change their lives in a way they cannot predict.

Stockett beautifully gives voice to all her characters. Each woman has her own distinct dialect that gives you such a vivid sense of who she is and how she feels. The story weaves seamlessly between these women and the lives they lead. It is hard to believe while reading this book that it is set a mere 50 years ago. You can feel the social tensions, the humiliation and anger that Stockett writes about. It is heartrending and uplifting all at the same time.


I was immediately pulled into this book. I wanted to keep reading, to dig deeper into these womens lives and see just what would come of everything. It was very hard for me to put down.

I highly recommend this book. Do not forget to read the authors thoughts after the acknowledgments at the end of the book. It gave a lot of insight into Ms. Stocketts life as a child in Jackson, MS and what moved her to write this book.

5 out of 5 stars

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