It’s been a long time since I found myself reading into the wee hours of the night (1am). I’ve been reading The Help by Kathryn Stockett, for 
my own Book Club and I couldn’t put it down. I finished it in two sittings.
The Help was set in 1962 in Jackson Mississippi; a few years after Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus to make way for white people. An unlikely friendship develops between, Skeeter the daughter of a Cotton Plantation owner, who’s white, recently graduated from college and dreams of becoming a writer and Aibileen, a black maid of one of her friends, who has raised 17 white babies in her time.
Skeeter wants to write a book from the perspective of the maids working for white families. However, she needs 12 maids to interview and this is going to take a lot of trust as the consequences to these women are grave.
A lot of the book was predictable, but I found myself laughing, cringing, shaking my head, angry, hopeful, frightened. I don’t want to spoil the book for people, but it was interesting to read it 50 years on and to see towards the end that there was a glimmer of hope for change.
Have you read it?
What did you think?
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