the help

I read this book months ago and it was one that I couldn't put down. I'm a kind of fascinated with African American/Black history and how it's portrayed in novels, especially set in the South. I have read a few Faulkner books that were fascinating, though not always easy to read, but were set during the time of slavery. This book is unique to me. It is set in the 60's and is from the perspective of three women, one white and the other two are black. It shows a relationship I have never heard of or encountered in other reading or cinema in quite the same way- that is, the relationship between "the help" and the family that pays them. These black women were hired at terrible wages to do the most precious work, raise children and keep a home. Most were treated poorly, some weren't. The heartbreaking issue to me was how attached these children inevitably became to their caretakers, and how parents responded to that closeness with bitterness and disgust; as well as, how those children who loved these women could still grow up to despise or pity the race of those women. It is complex relationship told with heart and courage. I especially enjoyed the pieces of real history (Martin Luther King, Jr.'s march, the development of the zip code) that put this novel in context and added to the reality of it, despite it not being real.

I give the help a thumbs up.