The Help, by Kathryn Stockett

The Help by Kathryn Stockett is absolutely wonderful. The story, the characters, the range of emotions, the heart, the soul, everything. This is a MUST read, especially because the movie comes out later this summer! I'm excited to see how the movie compares. . . although we know how that usually goes (ugh, did you see Eat,Pray, Love??) I'm willing to take the risk to be disappointed though because I am so supportive of the book. The previews look promising, so let's hope for the best.

This is a work of fiction, but I feel like parts of this book are probably autobiographical. The jacket tells us that this is Stockett's first novel; her notes at the end reveal the sentiment that this debut was long overdue.

The story centers primarily around two groups of women--the white women of Jackson, Mississippi, and their maids who double, triple, and quadruple as nannies, cooks, gardeners, and in the rare instance, friends. Through a rotation in narratives, we meet these women in their daily settings, as they give first-person accounts of their work, their thoughts, their hopes.

One of the white women decides to write a book. Her idea is to give personal accounts of the help and the secrets they've kept for their white women, the children they've raised for their white women, their heartaches, and their strength to hold their tongues. In order to put this book together, she must interview these women, but secretly because they can only begin to think of what would happen if the white community were to find out. I found myself holding my breath at times, scared that someone was going to find them, and cheering for them when the women come up with a brilliant way to guarantee that nobody knows the origin of the book whenever it is published.

This book is witty and heartfelt and there are two moments I can talk about where I completely burst into tears. There is at least one point in the story where I remember laughing out loud and many times where I sighed in exasperation, raised my eyebrows in surprise, or "HA!"ed at women's banter.

I can't wait for the movie and I can't wait for Stockett to write more!