"The Help" by Kathryn Stockett

Author Kathryn Stockett debuts with a page-turner that brings new insight to the moral issues involved in The Help. Stockett spins a story of social awakening as seen from both sides of the American racial divide intertwined with emotions that provokes timely thoughts. Set in Jackson, Miss in the 1962, the story is told from the perspective of three narrators. First and foremost is Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan, an aspiring writer attempting to simply tell a story that will impress and sell to an abrasive New York editor. Skeeter's novel idea is to interview the black maids in her hometown in order to fabricate a story of truth about what it's like to work for white women and raise the white children. Taking a risk of an integration violation, for which the black maids could be fired, jailed or worse, Skeeter forges ahead and finds two brave women who are fed-up enough to participate in the project.

Next the readers are introduced to Abileen. Since the death of her son, she has struggled to find acceptance, patience and the unconditional love of a child. She's lovingly raised more than a dozen white children, moving on to the next family "when the babies get too old and stop being color-blind." She is finding it hard to hold her tongue with her current boss, Elizabeth Leefolt, a childhood friend's of Skeeter's. Elizabeth is a neglectful, unloving mother and Abileen feels it necessary to compensate for her Elizabeth's lack of love, affection and acceptance by repeatedly telling the young daughter, "You is kind...you is smart. You is important."

The third narrator is Minny Jackson, who is known for her quick temper and fiery disposition. She's Abileen's best friend that finds herself without a job after tangling with Hilly Holbrooke, the head of the Junior League chapter, Skeeter's childhood friend and high and mighty above all else. Hilly takes her disdain for "the help" so far as to start a "Home Help Sanitation" initiative for "separate toilets as a disease-preventative measure." It is this hurtful, malicious attitude that proves to spur the black maids to tell their stories.

Filled with mystery and intrigue, readers are enticed to keep reading page after page. What "terrible awful" thing did Minny to do Hilly before leaving her mother's employment. What became of Constantine - Skeeter's beloved childhood maid that disappeared while she was away at college? What deep secret throws Minny's current boss into depression and causes her to keep big secrets from her husband? Will the maids suffer consequences and repercussions for telling their stories?

Stockett skillfully weaves the characters' stories reflecting their courage, fear and pride. Writing of her hometown, Stockett says she wrote The Help because she regrets never having asked her beloved family maid "what it felt like to be black in Mississippi, working for our white family." The novel addresses not only the injustice but the "inexplicable love" that blooms between the maids and their young charges. The Help evokes both admiration and respect and as Skeeter said of her writing, "please let some good come out of this."

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