the Help

By: Kathryn Stockett

This book came as a recommendation through a variety of my friends, one of which is one my favorite neighbors. (Please tell her that I said that because I have to live with her for the rest of the year!)

The Help is a marvelous tell-all book about a group of courageous women who decide to beat the odds by writing a book on the life of being part of the help in white households.  They tell all about the families they are employed under, the good the bad and the well, shitty. Excuse my terms! But it was in the book!

Skeeter has this marvelous idea, why not tell the world how it really is to live in the deep south with someone to raise you from birth until you're ready to leave the proverbial nest?  Aibileen, a new friend who is working under one of the more terrible families in the area, become adamant at the idea, then realizes how it could help everyone.  She pulls her friend Minny into the book idea, but we don't find out if she's up for it or against the idea, and it remains that way for a little while. Poor Minny, we hear her thoughts but it takes all that she is to keep her yap shut sometimes.  Aibileen is by herself but she loves raising children, since her pride and joy is no longer in the house that she takes care of herself. 

I admire the three women who are fictional, yet explain their reasoning's of their actions through the different stories that they tell.  Skeeter takes pride in the book that she is compiling, and beginning to understand the work environments that people like her mother and best friend have helped continue. Aibileen watches her friends and coworkers go through life raising other mothers babies, teach a hidden message to her last baby, and takes pride in herself for deciding to make a difference in the other women's lives by being a part of this book. Minny on the other hand, wishes that there was another way that she could earn her way to being away from those that hurt her, and still be able to raise her continuously growing family.  How do these women make a difference in their communities? Are they able to change history with their stories?

Stay tuned for a follow up post on the the movie, the Help starring my favorite, Emma Stone, as Skeeter. I'm getting the movie in this week, so hopefully it'll be a quick follow up!