The Help: Kathryn Stockett

• Hardcover: 464 pages
• Publisher: Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam; 1 edition (February 10, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0399155341
• ISBN-13: 978-0399155345
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.9 x 1.7 inches

Southern whites' guilt for not expressing gratitude to the black maids who raised them threatens to become a familiar refrain. But don't tell Kathryn Stockett because her first novel is a nuanced variation on the theme that strikes every note with authenticity. In a page-turner that brings new resonance to the moral issues involved, she spins a story of social awakening as seen from both sides of the American racial divide.

Newly graduated from Ole Miss with a degree in English but neither an engagement ring nor a steady boyfriend, Eugenia "Skeeter" Phelan returns to her parents' cotton farm in Jackson. Although it's 1962, during the early years of the civil rights movement, she is largely unaware of the tensions gathering around her town.

Skeeter is in some ways an outsider. Her friends, bridge partners and fellow members of the Junior League are married. Most subscribe to the racist attitudes of the era, mistreating and despising the black maids whom they count on to raise their children. Skeeter is not racist, but she is naive and unwittingly patronizing. When her best friend makes a political issue of not allowing the "help" to use the toilets in their employers' houses, she decides to write a book in which the community's maids -- their names disguised -- talk about their experiences.

Fear of discovery and retribution at first keep the maids from complying, but a stalwart woman named Aibileen, who has raised and nurtured 17 white children, and her friend Minny, who keeps losing jobs because she talks back when insulted and abused, sign on with Skeeter's risky project, and eventually 10 others follow.

Aibileen and Minny share the narration with Skeeter, and one of Stockett's accomplishments is reproducing African American vernacular and racy humor without resorting to stilted dialogue. She unsparingly delineates the conditions of black servitude a century after the Civil War.

The murders of Medgar Evers and Martin Luther King Jr. are seen through African American eyes, but go largely unobserved by the white community. Meanwhile, a room "full of cake-eating, Tab-drinking, cigarette-smoking women" pretentiously plan a fundraiser for the "Poor Starving Children of Africa." In general, Stockett doesn't sledgehammer her ironies, though she skirts caricature with a "white trash" woman who has married into an old Jackson family. Yet even this character is portrayed with the compassion and humor that keep the novel levitating above its serious theme. (Source Review: The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com Reviewed by Sybil Steinberg)

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The Help: Kathryn Stockett

Dear John The Best Nicholas Sparks

• Mass Market Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing; Mti edition (December 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446567337
• ISBN-13: 978-0446567336
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.1 x 1 inches

Just as I was about to give up on Nicholas Sparks after reading a string of mediocre novels following his first three blockbuster hits, I decided to give him one more chance. I'm glad I did! This is by far the best book he's written--even better than "The Notebook" and the two that followed, "Message in a Bottle" and "A Walk to Remember." I started reading "Dear John" at 8 PM one evening and couldn't put it down until I finished in the wee hours of the morning. Written in the first person by the young male protagonist, John Tyree, he tells the heartwarming story of his romance with the girl of his dreams--Savannah Lynn Curtis, whom he meets by chance one day on the beach. Their background and personalities are strikingly different, but yet they form an unexplainable bond that grows into a powerful love. Savannah is almost too good to be true, and I kept thinking: "Gee, I wish my son (who is John's age) could meet a girl like that!" I won't go into any details to spoil the plot, which turns out to have many twists and turns--not only involving John's relationship with Savannah but also a heartwarming story concerning John's father, John's time in the service, and his thoughts and emotions in general. This is a beautiful story, and frankly when I finished it left me emotionally drained where I wasn't able to get back to sleep just thinking about it. Not only is "Dear John" an entertaining read, but it was very well written and fast paced with a stirring conclusion. Congratulations to Nicholas Sparks on another winner! (Carole Imes)

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Dear John's Nicholas Sparks