The Help

Good storytelling is a rare thing. Granted, there are good books and good authors but not all have to ability to write so well that you wonder whether they stole someone's story and are telling it as their own. The last time I had this feeling was after reading Memoirs of a Geisha and according to the court case and subsequent settlement, I was right.
Kathryn Stockett, however is not completely unfamiliar with her book's subject matter, she was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi, the town which she writes about. Yet what's remarkable is not that she is able to convincingly tell the story of a White Southern woman who was raised by a loving Black woman and who has ambitions of being a writer - that's hardly farfetched given the author's own biography; it's that she is able to tell a believable and poignant story from a Black point of view, from the perspective of the maids. It may not seem such a difficult task, as one can always imagine what 'the help' are thinking but its the less tangible things - the sentiments, the aspirations, the ambiguity of their feelings towards the people they worked for and the children they cared for that makes this book so deserving of all the praise it has received. She is able to capture emotions and nuances so convincingly that we forget the colour of her skin at times and the fact that she comes from the 'other side'.
The story is so compelling that I found it impossible to put the book down; praying for my computer to take a little longer to start up so I continue reading and finish the chapter I'd started on my way to work. You can see the women in the story so vividly; the three main characters whose stories we hear, Skeeter, Aibeleen and Minny all inspire so much admiration, that you want to learn more about their lives and what will become of them after page 444.

The Help will move you and no matter how cynical you are it will make you acnowledge the simplicity of life when choose to ignore the fictitious lines that are meant to divide us.
The Help