The Story

The Summary of the novel is introduced here in my own words.

       Before we get to the summary: The Help starts off in the summer of 1962 and has three narrators: Aibileen, her best friend; Minny, and Miss Skeeter.

      The novel introduces an African American woman, Aibileen, who starts off talking about her life working as a maid in 1962 Mississippi.  She works for the Leefolt family and takes care of their daughter Mae Mobley;who is a toddler at this point. Mae Mobley is always neglected by her parents, barely seeing her father and having a mother, Elizabeth Leefolt, who tends to just not care and physically abuse when she feels it is necessary. For having feelings for Mae Mobley, Aibileen takes care of her and always tries to boost her self esteem by saying sweet things. Aibileen also is reminded of her son, Treelore, who died in a really bad truck accident a year or so before working with the family. Aibileen is working during a bridge game that Elizabeth hosted. Her friends(Other major characters in the novel) Hilly Holbrook and Skeeter Phelan are there. Hilly is the "powerful lady" of Jackson, husband running for local senate, herself being leader of an exclusive club in the city where all of them reside in. Hilly proposes a plan about having separate bathrooms for the colored maids outside of the house. Skeeter gets into an argument with Hilly over it by calling Hilly out on it. Hilly tempers up and Elizabeth tries to calm her down while Skeeter goes into the kitchen to ask Aibileen questions on what Hilly proposed. New to the idea of confessing her feelings to a white woman, Aibileen stays shut with an awkward stare off with Miss Skeeter until Miss Leefolt walks in to end that scene. Mrs. Leefolt wasn't too happy about not being in that conversation either. On the bus ride back home Aibileen remembers something bad that was said about her best friend, Minny, who was also on the bus. She tells her that during the bridge club Hilly warns everyone about how Minny (the maid of Missus Walters, Hilly's mother by the way) is a thief, therefore no one should hire her. Minny is looking for a job since Missus Walters is going to a nursing home, but was rejected multiple times. Now that she realizes why she can't get one, Minny tells Aibileen about a pie and how horrible that was for her to do.  (The novel switches from Aibileen to Minny now)

    Minny is still looking for a job and since Hilly has basically ruined her reputation by calling her a thief, she is ready to give up. A few days later she stumbles upon Celia Foote's household. Celia is looking for a maid, but with one condition; you can't tell Mr. Johnny Foote (Because Celia wants to learn and surprise Mr. Foote). Minny agrees but of course, she grows paranoid that Johnny would kill her if he ever were to stumble into the house when she was there. Johnny is also Hilly's ex-boyfriend and that plays a factor for Celia who is trying to get into Hilly's high society club. (The Story now goes to Miss Skeeter)

    After the game, Miss Skeeter goes back home to a cotton plantation right outside of Jackson. She is a new college graduate and that during her last year, around graduation, Constantine, the family maid and Skeeters best friend left the house without a reason. All Skeeter knows is that Constantine went up north and her mother is hiding the whole story. On the other hand, Skeeter is big on writing and hopes for a job in New York for a publishing company. The editor of the company, Elaine Stein, contacts Skeeter and informs her to get some experience first and then come back. She also requests Miss Skeeter to find topics that are controversial in society at the time. So, she gets a job at the Jackson Journal as a writer for the Miss Myrna column, a column about chores, housework, and relationships, something she doesn't know anything about. She asks Elizabeth to ask Aibileen questions, gets a yes, and starts working on her columns with Aibileen. Skeeter finds out about Aibileens son, Treelore, and how he wanted to be a writer too and that he was already in the works of making his own book about the Black man in Mississippi and his experiences. An idea blossoms for Elaine Steins request of "controversial topics". Skeeter will do this by interviewing African american maids and have them talk about their experience working as one in the south. Hilly on the other hand sets Skeeter up with Stuart Winsworth on a blind date. The guy is also known as the senators son throughout the book. He gets drunk during the date and ruins it by insulting her to a point where she regretted getting ready for it, no matter how hectic is was for her.(Goes to Minny)

   Its December now, and Minny is at the house, alone, working and wondering where Celia Foote is (since she is always around and annoying Minny). Next thing you know Mr. Foote comes through the door to surprise Celia, but instead scares the crap out of Minny while she was cleaning his bedroom. Minny realizes she might be killed by him because he doesn't know, but instead, he tells her to take care of Celia and keep their meeting a secret. (Goes over to Ms Skeeter)

   Aibileen agrees to work with Ms. Skeeter on the book and eventually gets Minny to join in. Skeeter needs a dozen and the rest of the maids Aibileen asks are too afraid to do so. Skeeter also steals a pamphlet on the Jim Crow Laws that her library has. (This will show up again in the plot again.) She writes on the the back " Jim Crow Laws and Hilly's bathroom law, what's the difference?" A couple of days after Stuart shows up on Skeeters plantation to say sorry and another chance at the date. Reluctant at first, Ms. Skeeter goes along and has a nice dinner with him, eventually leading to a kiss. Stuart and Skeeter start seeing each other twice a week from then on. (Goes to Minny)

    Minny goes to work and becomes curious as to what Celia does everyday in her bedroom. A package with bottles arrive one day and Celia becomes very excited over it. Minny sneaks into Celias room and assumes that she is an alcoholic. One day Minny comes to work to try to tell Celia she quits because she hates working for alcoholics and finds that Celia is having a miscarriage in the bathroom upstairs. She tells Minny it her fourth one.  Minny assumes its the alcohol, but Celia disproves her by saying it is tonic water that guarantees that miscarriages are prevented. Celia is concerned about not having any babies and that Johnny will dump her over natures problem. Minny tries to convince her otherwise and Celia then realizes that Minny has met Johnny. Still, Celia convinces Minny to keep it a secret even though EVERYONE KNOWS.

   A couple months pass and Yule May, another African American Maid, gets fired from working at Hilly's for stealing a ring that was worthless in the first place. Yule may asks Hilly for a loan, and was rejected, leading up to the incident. The loan was so that her sons could go to college. She was short about $70 dollars which could've been taken out of her check weekly to pay it back. She stole the ring and was sent to prison for four years, but the local church decides to cover the boys for college. Because of the event, Minny convinces eleven other maids to do the story. (One maid that attends another church decides to do it so that she can criticize Skeeter and then leave, so make that 10 maids) (Goes to Skeeter)

    Skeeter has dinner with the Winsworth family (Stuarts parents). At their house, the topic goes towards Stuarts ex with Stuart infuriated half the time. Skeeter confronts Stuart about it, Stuart tells her that his ex cheated on him with a civil rights activist, then breaks up with Skeeter. They go along with the rest of the night and made it seem as if nothing happened.

   While in a rush Skeeter leaves her bag with Hilly, which had the letters and Jim Crow Laws in it.  Hilly of course goes through it (Unluckily and Luckily only finds the Jim Crow Laws)  and then uses it to blackmail Skeeter in a way. Skeeter has to print out the bathroom proposal for Hilly along with a couple of other errand for her. She prints it but then "accidentally" prints out a toilet drive underneath instead of a coat drive. The next morning there are bunch of toilets on her lawn and it goes on national news. As a result, Skeeter is out of the bridge club and is hanging by a thread when it comes to the high society women's (Jackson's Junior League) club.  The other maids begin to help although they are scared to the point where very little info comes out at first. Time will heal.

    The Junior League Annual Ball comes along and Celia tries to make a good impression on Hilly and the other gals. However, she comes dressed up a little inappropriately according to most of them and gets drunk to make it worse. On top of that, she tries to explain Johnny and their relationship about how she didn't steal him away, but instead rips a sleeve off of Hilly and vomits on the floor. Once she gets home, she becomes depressed over it to the point where she thinks about leaving Johnny for it. Minny convinces her otherwise. Minny does this by telling Celia about what she did to Hilly before leaving Missus Walker. Hilly, being a pain, threatens Minny to work for her, but Minny refuses and tells her to "eat her shit". So Minny bakes her a cake with her shit in it and Hilly eats two slices of it before she asked what was in it. After realizing, Hily attempts to ruin Minny's life. Celia is content after learning that.

   Its December and Skeeter is in a rush about finishing the book because the dead line is in a couple of weeks. Knowing Hilly, Minny tells Skeeter to publish the cake incident into the book as a safeguard in the case that people realize they are the ones being talked about. If Hilly declares it was about her, then she would be known as the shit eater, but of course knowing Hilly, she wouldn't say that it is. Skeeter also learns the truth about Constantine, her maid who left, and the truth about her "pale daughter". In the end Skeeter finds out Constantine dies three weeks after moving. Skeeter also gets back with Stuart, and then mails the book to Elaine upon completion hoping it would make the deadline. They named it "Help".

   The next month Stuart proposes and Skeeter says yes, but as soon as she told him about the book, he declines the offer. Skeeter finds out the book will be published even if the number amount is only 5,000. Once published, people catch on that the book is based in Jackson. Hilly starts a whole front to find out which maids were involved, and every time she found someone, she told their employer to fire them. That was, of course until she read her own chapter.(The final chapter by the way)

She goes to confront Skeeter for writing it, but fails at it. Skeeter at the same times gets a job offer she dreamed of in New York, and Aibileen and Minny encourages her to take it. Hilly finds out where Leroy, Minny's husband, works and gets him fired because of Minny. Leroy tries to kill Minny but she leaves the town with her kids to a cousins place, not to far from Celia's place. Then comes Aibileens turn. Hilly confronts Eliabeth about the L shaped crack in a table to convince her that a chapter was written about her by Aibileen. She doesnt exactly bite (A little slow to the head) so Hilly tries to frame Aibileen for theft of silver. Aibileen threatens Hilly on her chapter and gets away without the cops coming after her. However she had a saddening moment with " Baby Girl" (Mae Mobley) before she left.

  Skeeter also gets Aibileen a job for the Miss Myrna column at the same rate of pay, and as a result, Aibileen swears to write about everyone she worked with in her life until her very last day on Earth.