Book 1 Response

[Chelsea]

I am currently reading the book "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett. I am not finished with this book yet, but what I can tell it's a great book. It's about how Skeeter comes back home from college to find her favorite maid gone. Skeeter's mother wants her to find a husband, but all she wants is to write. Aibileen is a black maid who takes care of many families, but had recently been taking care of this one family. Minny is Aibileen's best friend who is the sassiest of them all. Her big mouth gets her into trouble with every job she has had. She finally finds a job, but her bosses have their own secrets. These three women come together to write this book that reveals the many secrets about the people of their towns and of themselves. I enjoy reading this book. I'm almost done with it, but I wish it will never end.

I relate to Skeeter the most. One connection I have with her is that I don't meet the expectations that people have of me. Skeeter's mother wants her to get married because most of her friends are married. Skeeter wants to do what she loves, but is being restricted because of what she "has" to do. I relate to that because I don't do what others want me to. My father wants me to go to college for soccer and play professionally, but that's not what I want. I don't want to upset him, but I want to do what makes me happy. I want to be successful and I feel playing soccer professionally won't get me where I want to be. Both Skeeter and I want to do what we want, but have others telling us what we need to do. In the end we both will do what we really desire.

I also relate to her because we can't take bad news from people easily. Throughout the story, her mother keeps from her what really happened to her maid Constantine because she wants to help her. I don't take bad news well, so my parents and friends keep things from me to help me. Both Skeeter and I want to know things, but the people around us think it's for the better that we don't know.

I can easily relate to this book. As an African American child, I can see how I would have been treated back then. I greatly recommend this book to anyone who wants to know more about the segregation in the 1960s.

Green, John. The Fault in Our Stars. New York: Dutton, 2012. Print.

[Name Gautam]

If THE HELp has been written in memory of Demeterie,it is an immensely moving tribute.The characters of Aibleen and Minny have been superbly painted and the emotional relationship brought out between Aibleen and Baby Mae Mobley is deeply moving.The parting exchange between the two brings tears to the eyes.
katherine stockett has truly created a masterpiece.
Gautam Mookerjee,Kolkata,India.

[Margaret]

I finally got around to reading THE HELP after seeing the movie quite some time back. The novel was so good. I usually like the novels better than the movie versions, but a good job was done on the movie as well. It is hard to imagine how life could have been for so many African Amerians growing up and living in the South. We need to be reminded of our country's history, so the past is not prologue to the future.





I was very young during the early 1960's

[Nora]

Name Gautam wrote: "If THE HELp has been written in memory of Demeterie,it is an immensely moving tribute.The characters of Aibleen and Minny have been superbly painted and the emotional relationship brought out betwe..."

"I is smart, I is pretty, I is kind"....how did that go? I just loved Abileen's interaction w/ Mae and her efforts to give the child hope/strength.