Friday 56 & Book Beginnings: The Help

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

Mae Mobley was born on an early Sunday morning in August, 1960.  A church baby we like to call it. Taking care a white babies, that's what I do, along with all the cooking and cleaning. I done raised seventeen kids in my lifetime. I know how to get them babies to sleep, stop crying, and go in the toilet bowl before they mamas even get out a bed in the morning.

- p. 1, The Help by Kathryn Stockett

"Mama," I say, just wanting to end this conversation, "would it really be so terrible if I never met a husband?"

- p. 56 The Help by Kathryn Stockett

Ok. I'm a day late. But this is a good one, believe me. Remember this post about me wanting to read the books which were turned into movies for the 2011 Oscars? I borrowed a copy of The Help off a friend and I ... just .. couldn't ... put this down! I laughed, I cried, I was shocked and I rooted for them. And it made me think how easy we have it, despite there are still being traces of racism in everyday life.

Here's the back cover blurb:

Enter a vanished and unjust world: Jackson, Mississippi, 1962. Where black maids raise white children, but aren't trusted not to steal the silver...

There's Aibileen, raising her seventeenth white child and nursing the hurt caused by her own son's tragic death; Minny, whose cooking is nearly as sassy as her tongue; and white Miss Skeeter, home from College, who wants to know why her beloved maid has disappeared.

Skeeter, Aibileen and Minny. No one would believe they'd be friends; fewer still would tolerate it. But as each woman finds the courage to cross boundaries, they come to depend and rely upon one another. Each is in a search of a truth. And together they have an extraordinary story to tell...

If you've watched the movie, then  you know it's an amazing movie. While funny, it is based on truth in the not-so-distant past and it captures it all with amazing acting.  I  highly recommend both the book and the movie.