A Five Star Read For Sure!!

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Absolutely 5 stars hands down!! I hope there is a sequel so I can hear what happens to each of the characters.



A great book about the Help AKA the colored house maids to the white folk of the 1950's and 60's in Jackson, Mississippi. All around great read and enlightening too. I've never considered myself a prejudice person. I've never really understood why the color of someone's skin can make such a difference to some? I guess a lot of it comes from ignorance. Not that I am excusing anyone for their ignorance...

There are so many great stories good and bad that opened my eyes to what really did go on in some cities like this back in the 60's when Martin Luther King was making his debut with his speeches and the civil rights movement was going full force. I loved learning more about these women. I know it is a historical fiction, but I can only assume what went on in this book is very similar to what really went on... I was so happy to read of the good white folk who treated their Help with dignity...they treated them like equals...But don't be fooled there are a lot of heartbreaking sad stories too, of down right mean and prejudice people.

Some of my favorite parts of the book I have quoted here. Now it may not be exactly as it appears in the book as far as spelling and punctuation, because I listened to this read.

In this part Miss Skeeter(Eugenia) had been called ugly by a boy at school. Her black maid Constantine comforted her and they had this conversation:

Constantine: "Well...is you?..."

Miss Skeeter: "Constantine sat down next to me, at the kitchen table...she pressed her thumb hard into the palm of my hand. Something we both knew meant, listen...listen to me...

Constantine: "Now you looka here Eugenia...Ugly live up on the inside, ugly be a hurtful mean person...Is you one of dem peoples?..."  "Every morning, until you dead in da ground, you gone have to make dis decision...you gone have to ask yo-self...am I gone believe what dem fools say about me today?"

Miss Skeeter: "She kept her thumb pressed hard in my hand, I nodded that I understood. I was just smart enough to realize she meant...white people. And even though I still felt miserable, and knew that I was...most likely ugly. It was the first time she ever talked to me like I was something besides my mother's white child. All my life I'd been taught what to believe about politics, colored's, being a girl, but with Constantine's thumb pressed in my hand, I realized I actually had a choice in what I could believe.

I Loved hearing all of the wisdom in Abilene's stories to May Mobley. I wish I had bookmarked all of them here is one I did book mark:



One of Abilene's stories to May Mobley:

Once upon a time there was two little girls, one girl had black skin, one girl had white.
Little colored girl say to the white girl "How come yo skin be so pale?" White girl say, "I don't know, how come yo skin be so black? What choo think that mean?" But neither one of dem girls knew, so little white girl say, "Well, let's see..You got hair, I got hair," Little colored girl say, "You got a nose I got a nose," little white girl say, "I got toes, you got toes." So we's the same, just a different color, said the little color girl, the little white girl, she agreed and they was friends.

A quoted portion of the book I liked Miss Skeeter saying:

I can't help but think what my life would be like if I hadn't written the book? Monday, I would have played bridge, and tomorrow night I'd be going to the league meeting and turning in the newsletter. Then on Friday night Stuart would take me to dinner, and we'd stay out late, and I'd be tired when I got up for my tennis game on Saturday...tired and content n' frustrated, because Hilly would have called her maid a thief that afternoon, and I would have just sat there and listened to it, and Elizabeth would have grabbed her child's arm too hard and I would've looked away like I didn't see it. and I'd be engaged to Stuart, and I wouldn't wear short dresses, only short hair, or consider doing anything risky, like write a book about colored housekeepers...too afraid he'd disapprove. And while I'd never lie and tell myself I actually changed the minds of people like Hilly and Elizabeth, at least I don't have to pretend I agree with them anymore.
-Miss Skeeter

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