The Help

From Strand Bookstore

Set deep in the heart of Mississippi, circa 1962, 'The Help' offers readers an enchanting and original journey into the trying lives and times of three very different women who chose to come together for a common cause. In this book weare introduced to 22 year-old Skeeter, who has recently graduated school and is being pushed into marriage; Aibileen, a wise and regal maid whose troubles as an African American in Mississippi are enough on their own; and Aibileen's best friend Minny, whose just been put out of another job and is in need of help. Through author Kathryn Stockett's touching and remarkable characters this moving narrative will take readers by the hand and lead them to new places.

From the Publisher

Limited and persecuted by racial divides in 1962 Jackson, Mississippi, three women, including an African-American maid, her sassy and chronically unemployed friend, and a recently graduated white woman, team up for a clandestine project against a backdrop of the budding civil rights era. 100,000 first printing.

Review

Sybil Steinberg - Washington Post
"Kathryn Stockett['s]...first novel is a nuanced variation on the theme that strikes every note with authenticity. In a page-turner that brings new resonance to the moral issues involved, she spins a story of social awakening as seen from both sides of the American racial divide."

Review

Karen Valby - Entertainment Weekly
"[THE HELP] is graceful and real, a compulsively readable story of three women who watch the Mississippi ground shifting beneath their feet as the words of men like Martin Luther King Jr. and Bob Dylan pervade their genteel town."

More about the book

At the outset of the civil rights movement in Jackson, Mississippi, three unique women unite to share the stories of dozens of the city's black servants, who have been kept voiceless for too long. Skeeter is fresh home from college, with big dreams of becoming a journalist, though her mother just wants her to find a husband. Aibileen, a black maid, is the heart and soul of her household, now working on raising her seventeenth white child. Her best friend Minnie, is the best cook in the city, but can not find a job because of her tendency to speak the cold truth. Together, these three unforgettable ladies launch a crusade to collect the stories of the town's silent servants, and try to tear down the unspoken racial barriers that traverse the homes and hearts of everyone in Jackson.

Synopses

In Jackson, Mississippi, in 1962, there are lines that are not crossed. With the civil rights movement exploding all around them, three women start a movement of their own, forever changing a town and the way women--black and white, mothers and daughters--view one another.