The Help

By: Kathryn Stockett

Narrated by: Jenna Lamia, Bahni Turpin, Octavia Spencer, Cassandra Campbell

Length: 18 hrs and 6 mins

Publisher's summary

Three ordinary women are about to take one extraordinary step.

Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid, Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.

Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her 17th white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.

Minny, Aibileen's best friend, is short, fat, and perhaps the sassiest woman in Mississippi. She can cook like nobody's business, but she can't mind her tongue, so she's lost yet another job. Minny finally finds a position working for someone too new to town to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own.

Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.

In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women—mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends—view one another.

This edition now includes the afterword "Too Little, Too Late—Kathryn Stockett in Her Own Words", as read by the author.

Bonus Audio: Hear an exclusive interview with Kathryn Stockett.

©2009 Kathryn Stockett, Cover Art: (c) 2011 DreamWorks II Distribution Co., LLC (P)2009 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

“The two principal maid characters...leap off the page in all their warm, three dimensional glory...[A] winning novel.” (The New York Times)

“This could be one of the most important pieces of fiction since To Kill a Mockingbird…If you read only one book...let this be it.” (NPR.org)

“A beautiful portrait of a fragmenting world.” (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)

Amazing Book

I recommend this book to everyone. Until I moved to the SC low country four years ago, I lived in the north, and I am a caucasian. The South is like a different country. I did not understand the issue regarding the confederate flag flying over the state capitol. Since listening to this book, I have an entirely different perspective regarding both the flag issue and some of the problems black southerners faced in the 20th Century.

Loved this book!

This was one of the best books I've listened to and I've been at it for several years. The story is wonderful and having three different readers gives the narrative even more richness. I highly recommend this book (and I don't believe I have bothered to write more than one or two other reviews).

The Help

This was one of the best audio books I've downloaded. The voices of the readers made the book come alive and I could hear them talking long after I finished the story. The language in the story was wonderful. I'd highly recommend The Help.

Hands Down One of the Best Audiobooks Ever

Kudos to the author and narrators on a great book. I hated for the book to end. We named a room in our house the Relaxing Room in honor of Skeeter, Avaline and Minnie. I have listened to over 300 books on audio and this is hands down one of the best ever.

My New Favorite Book

The Help has now made my favorite of all times Audible listens. There is nothing in the story or the reading of it that I would have changed.

It's beautifully written about the lives of 3 women and the racially divided community they live in. Since finishing the book, I know that I will come back to it again and again, it's that type of book. Being in Abeline's kitchen with Ms. Skeeter and Minnie feels as comfortable as a warm fuzzy blanket.

If you get this book, be prepared to make a few new close friends...and analyze how you treat the ones you have.

Along with everybody else......

What can I say? It blew me away. There are so many things to comment on. I would never have read this book had I not seen the movie (against my inclination, although I admit it was wonderful), because I read (and watch movies) strictly for entertainment, and books like these are too painful to be entertaining.The performances are Academy-Award worthy, and the story is mesmerizing. Having been raised in the northwest by non-bigoted parents, I had no idea of the depth or breadth of the racism practiced in the South as recently as 50 years ago. The paradox of those white women depending so COMPLETELY on those black women for pretty much everything while simultaneously treating them like disposable towels is breathtaking. And mistakenly using the wrong bathroom? In trying to understand it, the only event I could liken the toilet situation to is when strange dogs poop in my yard and my complaints are loud. But I could never take a TIRE IRON to a dog, much less a human being. The level of racist hysteria that could be achieved over trivialities was unpleasantly very impressive.
But this a book review, not an essay..
I appreciated Kathryn's epilogue, when she explains that even though empathizing to a degree, she could not pretend to know what it felt like to be a black women working for a white woman during that era. How could she? But her book is magnificent. When an author can bring tears to your eyes with one line, and make you laugh out loud the next, she's done something right.

we all need to read this

I love this book! it breaks my heart that we treat people insuch degrading ways. we all live lives that no one else will, and we have so much to learn from one another no matter what the color of our skin is or any other difference we have.

Excellent

Excellent story. intriguing, gut wrenching. It's so easy to forget that life was like this at one time.

Phenomenal writing -- and reading

This is a writer's read, wonderful characterizations, dialects delightfully read, details perfectly accurate, an unpredictable plot with interesting twists and turns. As a Yankee who moved to Lexington in '78 and was shocked by "the help", racism and friends with "mammys" this makes it all fit perfectly. Insightful...don't miss it. It's a shame it ended so soon. Hope she writes more.

The Help

There should be a category for "narrators" at the Academy Awards. This book could not have been the same with out the definition they gave each character. Listening to it was like a movie without the video. Absolutely wonderful. I can't imagine any book having to follow it, I hope Stockett is working on another. Excellent!!!