the Help by Kathryn Stockett
 | The HelpBy: Kathryn Stockett Published by: Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam Genre: fiction Author’s Website: http://www.kathrynstockett.com/ Author’s Twitter: n/a Author’s Facebook: MOVIE TIE-IN: AWARDS: 2010 Indies Choice Book of the Year – Adult Debut 2010 Southern Independent Booksellers Association’s Book of the Year for Fiction BookClub pick: January 2011 |
the Synopsis {from the author’s website}:
Three ordinary women are about to take one extraordinary step.
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.
My Thoughts:
I’ve been sitting here about 15 minute trying to decide how to start this review. lol. You see, much to my surprise I absolutely LOVED this book. That seems simple enough to say, right? Then problem then becomes how much do I include to show you WHY I loved it. If I tell you all my favorite bits, will it be “spoiling” the book for you? Ugh. You guys are killing me! lol!
When I was browsing the book shelves in my favorite Aunts house, desperate to find something for my book club pick, she handed me her copy of the Help. I, being a horror lover by design, shriveled my nose and tried to hand it back to her. “Just read it…” she says “you’ll love it, I know YOU will.” and she made this kind of cuckoo face. You know,the eyebrows went up and a head nod was included for effect. Like there was some kind of inside joke we were in on, only I WASN’T “in” on it. LOL. I love my Auntie though, and I swear if you knew her you would too, so I put the book on my take home stack not feeling a bit of eagerness to begin the journey through it’s pages.
I grudgingly began my journey around 7pm on January 4th. I closed the book, already missing my friends, the morning of January 6th.
That’s how I feel too. I am sad I read it so fast. I miss my friends. Stockett did an amazing job of character development. Skeeter, who I think if she were a real person very well could have become my best friend. Mrs Aibileen, bless her heart, such a caring soul. Everyone’s memaw. I really could just hug on to her and never let go. And then Minny. Oh my word. Can I just say if I had been a black maid in Mississippi *did I spell that right? emm eye crooked letter cooked letter..oh hell* in 1962, I would have BEEN Minny! I love her. I want Minny to have her own book. And a tv show. haha.
The book is so well written. There is a gradual build and a fantastic climax. I always say a good book is like sex… and without the climax, well, the rest of it is just a bunch of work.
<—-heres a little spoiler bit maybe, read it with caution. LOL—->
I hated ole “two slice Hilly”, and LAUGHED OUT LOUD when she finally got her ‘”just desserts”. I wanted to save lil MaeMo, and raise her as my own. I wanted to hug Mrs Celia, and just be there for her. I wanted to high five Skeeter, and tell her how much I admired her!
<—-end the spoiler bit—->
This book was, in my humble opinion… just awesome. I laughed, I cried, and now I miss my storybook friends.