The help, by Kathryn Stockett

It's the early '60s, and racist Mississippi is reluctantly on the edge of change. But while laws are beginning to be changed to give black people the right to go to the same school as whites and use the same public areas, attitudes are slow to follow. These are dangerous times - but this does not stop white Skeeter and two black maids coming together in a clandestine project that will put them all at risk.

Skeeter is desparate to be a writer, but although she has been brought up in a traditional household, she is also very well aware of the disparities between the races. She wants the black women who make white lives so comfortable to tell their stories...

The stories in this book were so moving - Constantine, who raised Skeeter, was forced to give up her own child, for example. The background of racism made me angry and it really wasn't so long ago.

Spurred on by her own childhood experiences in a white family with black servants, Stockell has done her research into the period and its attitudes so well that everything rings true.
A must-read!

Rating - I give this 5/5

GREAT!!

Get this from the library

Reviewed by Jan @ Ballarat