Reviews with content warning for Excrement - The Help

Reviews tagging 'Excrement'

michaelion's review

emotional funny tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

My opinion might be biased. Of the few movies me and my mom have watched together in my life, I could probably count them on one hand, this was one we both loved when it was available On Demand on Dish or DirectTv or whichever one of those cable providers had that service. The next year I bought the book at the Scholastic book fair, one with a cover from the movie poster, and I read that book six times. The spine is worn out and the edges of the cover are all bent up because I used to try to carefully put it in my backpack, but I haven't carried a backpack since sixth grade, so all my backpacks were actually big bags / purses anyone could see from a mile away, so of course my homework and any books I carried would slide and get smooshed and wrinkled and folded up if I dropped something in there and it landed wrong.

I don't know what impact this book left on me. I assume an important one. I still love the book despite the controversy, maybe also in spite of it. My grandmother was born in Jackson. She and Mae Mobley would've been a week apart, if they were both alive and real, respectively. Her side of the story, what would've been my grandmother's I mean, isn't shown, but maybe someone story she would've known was. Maybe her auntie or cousin or someone who she went to church with, had her mother not moved out of the South before she was three months old. I don't know. The story's very real. Whether or not it connects to you personally, who doesn't have a soft spot for those?

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gerzonvillegas's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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ashybear02's review

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challenging emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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rachel_here's review

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emotional hopeful inspiring medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

The Help takes place in the city of Jackson, Mississipi, in the year 1962. We follow the point of view of three characters: Skeeter, a white woman in her early twenties who dreams of writing and struggles to fit in; Aibileen, a black maid who has looked after the children of white women for many years; and Minnie, Aibileen's best-friend and a great cook, but whose temper often get her in troubles with her employers. The three of them feel trapped in their current life, but all is about to change when Skeeter decides to write a book about the lives of black maids in the South and seeks Aibileen's and Minnie's help for her project.

I remember fondly The Help (or "La Couleur des Sentiments" / "The Color of Feelings" in its French translation) from back when I was in middle-school, where I watched the movie, and then highschool, where I read the book. The story is entertaining and easy to read enough, and I particularly enjoyed Aibileen's point-of-view chapters. But fondness for this book and its movie adaptation alone can't make me forget its issues regarding the treatment of its subject matter (which many articles have already discussed online), so I'll have to settle for 3.25 stars. Despite being a fine book, it's still an extremely flawed portrayal of racism in the United States that banks too much on being a nostalgic, feel-good story to offer a true understanding of a still-too-pervasive issue. One must just be aware of that before picking up The Help.

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