Tag Archives: The Help

I Got Waylaid

I Got Waylaid

The Help

At precisely 3:45 pm yesterday I picked up the book ‘The Help’.  This was one of three I bought a couple of weeks ago and left it for the last primarily because the other two authors were established favorites.  I read ‘The Help’ largely because so many friends recommended it aware that it might just be fashionable because of the subject matter and hype.

A few sentences into the book I stopped, wondering if an editor had done a particularly poor job.  Rereading I discovered this was the tone and language and decided to continue through at least the first chapter.

Then it happened….I was so gone, immersed in Kathryn Stockett’s world of the southern sixties and I did not come up for air until 5pm today when I finished it.

Midnight came and common sense demanded I sleep.  Shut off the light for all of five minutes.  Woke up this morning determined not to touch the book until affairs of the day were looked after.  This was a day for running around chores and the book went with for it all.  I read in line and at the restaurant I lunched at.

‘The Help’ is gripping right down to the last sentence.  There wasn’t one paragraph or page I skipped through lightly.  This is my WOW book of the year!

It got me thinking about how social change takes place and how all the small things that seem small at the time become part of an unimaginable result.  It made me wonder if I have ever contributed anything to social or environmental change.  Social change occurs through rebellion, refusing to accept the status quo and I have had times of such but I am not sure it had a favorable impact on anything or anybody.  Oh….of course none of those Mississippi folk had any idea of their impact either…hmmmm…maybe…just maybe.