THE HELP by Kathryn Stockett

The Help is a debut novel by author Kathryn Stockett. The setting is a small community in Mississippi in 1962. Each chapter in succession is told in the voice and perspective from three different women. The first, Eugenia ‘Skeeter’ Phelan, is a recent graduate of the university and has reluctantly come home to live. She doesn’t easily fit back into society as all of her closest friends have married and have children. They look upon her as an oddity and a failure because she is not married and has few prospects. She wants to be a writer. The other two women are black maids, Aibileen and Minny. To be taken seriously as a writer, Skeeter is advised to write on a topic of note. Skeeter decides to write a book each chapter of which focuses on the experiences of the community’s household maids in 1962. The book chronicles how she wins the confidence of the maids in spite of the fear of what would happen if the project were discovered. The Help describes how women, regardless of color or status, moved within the system and the restraint of time and place. Excellent book, I would highly recommend it. READ IT!or don't

-Carolyn Hirst-Loucks