April 2011 Selection

Carol has chosen The Help by Kathryn Stockett as the April 2011 selection.

From the author's website:

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 seventeenth 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. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't.

The Book Snobs Gathering

The Snobs gathered at Carol's home on Monday, April 25th. We enjoyed appetizers and wine followed by a delicious white asparagus lasagna served with salad and garlic bread. Dessert was a light but very tasty pound cake with strawberries and white chocolate pudding.

Several of our usual attendees were absent, but that didn't slow down our discussion one bit. We talked about life in the South and how it has changed and not changed since the 1960s. We discussed specific characters and the impact that changing roles of women and integration had on their lives. We even discussed the most radical or unusual beauty treatments each of us has undergone in the name of beauty. I was particularly interested in the different perceptions of race among our members and we talked specifically about changes that have taken place in our own lifetimes. There was a significant difference that I perceived to be related to the differences in our ages.

I highly recommend The Help to anyone who is looking for an interesting book that is great for discussion.