I'm kind of a sporadic reader. I recently read 2 books that I really liked but I don't think I had picked up a book for 2 or 3 months before that. I really like to read so I'm not sure why I stray away from it so often. I thought a book club might be a good thing because then I'd have to read at least one book a month. I tried to join one a few months back that one of my friends from work is a part of. I thought I'd really enjoy being part of book club but this one just wasn't for me. For the most part it was a bunch of women sitting around talking about their personal lives. I think they discussed the book for maybe 5 minutes out of the two hours I was there. Not so fun when you don't know the people they are talking about.
Anyway, I was going to give the book club another try so I read their choice for May which was The Help. I LOVED this book. I actually found myself slowing down at the end because I didn't want it to end.
Be prepared to meet three unforgettable women:
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...
I wasn't thrilled with the ending of this book. It felt like the author was tired of writing so she just wrapped it all up quickly. But it's definitely worth reading. I'm giving it 5 out of 5 stars on my rating scale.
Bonus: a film adaptation of The Help is currently in the works! I just hope they do it right!
The book finished last week is Hissy Fit. This was a fun, quick read.
Synopsis from Barnes & Noble:
Keeley Murdock's wedding to A.J. Jernigan should have been the social event of the season. But when she catches her fiance doing the deed with her maid of honor at the country club rehearsal dinner, all bets are off. And so is the wedding. Keeley pitches the hissy fit of the century, earning herself instant notoriety in the small town of Madison, Georgia.
Even worse is the financial pressure A.J.'s banking family brings to bear on Keeley's interior design business. But riding to the rescue — in a vintage yellow Cadillac — is the redheaded stranger who's bought a failing local bra plant. Will Mahoney hires Keeley to redo the derelict antebellum mansion he's bought. Her assignment: decorate it for the woman of his dreams — a woman he's never met.
Only a designing woman like Keeley Murdock can find a way to clear her name and give her cheating varmint of an ex-fiance the comeuppance he so richly deserves.
This book had a pretty predictable ending, but I would have been disappointed had it ended any other way. I'll give it a 4.5 out of 5.
Have you read either of these books?
Do you have any recommendations for good reads?
