The Help by Kathryn Stockett

It appears that this book it out of sequence and I do apologise to the readers and followers of this blog.

About the Author: Kathryn Stockett was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi. After graduating from the University of Alabama with a degree in English and Creative Writing, she moved to New York City where she worked in magazine publishing and marketing for nine years. She currently lives in Atlanta with her family. The Help is her first novel.

What we thought of it: Nearly all the group thought that it was a very brave book to write. The story itself was about a group of married white women and their black maids. The maids generally work long hours and also raise the children within their care. 'Skeeter' returns from University and unlike the women that she went to school with and her mother she wants more form life than a man and a ring on her finger. She wants to be a journalist. She normally seeks solace with Constantine her maid but whilst she was away Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell her where she has gone. Abileen 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 to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own. Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.

Some members of the group considered Skeeter to be taking an extreme risk to write an account of life with a white family in Missippi at that time from a black woman's perspective. Abileen the maid also took that risk as she may be unemployable should it become known what she was doing. She had already lost her son who was attached when others looked the other way. The apartheid that existed at that time shocked some of the group at the realisation that this was within our life time and only in the 1960s. Hilly and her friends being rude to the maids and believing that they were dirty, also sharing this with their children. The turning point for Skeeter was Hilly's project for all the black maids to have separate bathroom outside of the house as 'they carry different diseases' from white people.

Some members of the group felt that the racist themes and the injustice of apartheid were sensitively dealt with in the novel. Each event relaying the racist theme through the interplay of the relationships between Hilly and her friends and also the interplay between each of the characters and the maid. It was interesting to note that Minny who after losing her job in town because she could not keep her mouth shut, found a job with a newcomer to the town. Minny's new employer is not influenced by Hilly and her friends as she is also an outcast and despite her efforts does not 'fit' within the social group and is not accepted into the social circlw.

Skeeter meets with Abileen and Minny to write the book and includes several anecdotes from whilst they were working with Hilly and her friends. Although Skeeter is discreet working at night she has a near miss where she leaves her satchel with her notes in it at Hilly's. Minny is a fantastic cook and one of the stories she tells relates to a time when she was in Hilly;s employ and she bakes pie into which she puts faeces. Hilly eats two pieces. When Skeeter eventually publishes her book it is this event, that despite the names being changed to lightly disguise the town and it's dwellers, that Hilly recognises herself. At which point she insists that Abileen is dismissed from her employer who is one of Hilly's friends and fronts out the humiliation.

It is difficult to judge whether it was Skeeter's intention to have an underlying theme of racial equality or whether it was a bi-product of a selfish act in order to have an exclusive and controversial story to make her name in journalism. Did she consider the fall out and the impact that it had on the Abileen and her friends? Apart from the obvious initial embarrassment did it really have an impact locally in addressing racism at that time? Was this the intention solely to escape from her ailing mothers clutches and her boyfriend who on hearing of the content of her book breaks off the relationship. Ironically Skeeter also discovers that her mother had direct involvement in Constantine's disappearance.

The book now has been turned into a movie. By all accounts the story has been re-produced in a light hearted way with much emphasis on the style and the humour. The film skirts over the issue of racism which is the fundamental theme of the book. It is difficult to understand how this issue can be avoided when it is the core of the civil rights movement in America. Is it because the primary purpose of the film a bit like Skeeter's book is that it needs to be a Box Office success.

There are no choices at the end of this review. However the next book in this blog will be The Snow Geese by William Fiennes

The Drunkard's Walk, How randomness rules our lives by Leonard Mlodinow

About the Author: Mlodinow was born in Chicago Illinois of parents who were both Holocaust survivors. His father had been a leader in the Jewish resistance under Nazi rule in his hometown in Poland and then spent more than a year in Buchenwald concentration camp. When Mlodinow was a child he had been interested in both mathematics and chemistry and was tutored in organic chemistry whilst at high school by a professor of the University of Illinois. His interest turned to physics whilst he was on break from University which he spent at a kibbutz. When having little to do in the evenings he read The Feyman Lectures on Physics which was the only book in English in the kibbutz library. He undertook extensive research in physics and developed a new type of perturbation theory for eigenvalue problems in quantum mechanics and pioneering work on the quantum theory for dielectric media.
About the Book: The Guardian Book review provides the following insight to the randomness theory that permeates this book. 'A chance is what you take when you cannot calculate the odds. If the odds are in your favour, then in the long run, you'll win. What are the chances that you could flip a coin 10 million times and get heads every time? Very high, according to probability theory. Go on flipping and, over a period almost indistinguishable from eternity, you'd get myriad uninterrupted stretches of heads or tails. The catch is you'd never know whether you were in a stretch of 10 million consecutive wins or losses until after the event.That is the second lesson of this delightful book: risky ventures, long shots and random outcomes have a way of looking like good bets, but only after the event. Almost everything that happens in life is contingent upon a series of unconscious gambles: of turnings taken, of chance encounters and unconsidered choices - in short, the drunkard's walk of the title. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, it was easy enough to track back to the warning signs and condemn the high command for not having read them correctly. But this was to impose a selected pattern on what - before the bombs began to fall - would have been a bewildering array of conflicting intelligence amassed over many months from listening posts around the globe. Pearl Harbor wasn't a random event - somebody planned it - but until it had happened, such an attack could have been predicted in many places, or not at all. The dilemma for all gamblers is: just because such a thing is probable, does that mean it is going to happen this time?'
The Review: Surprisingly the people that were thought may not like the book did- is this Mladilow's theory in action? One of the over riding conclusions is that it is dangerous to judge ability by short term events. Most events it is claimed seem random or may even appear to follow a pattern, this can be luck and not necessarily skill.

One of the examples given is that of the Maserati boss who was giving away a car and it behind some doors, he opened one of the doors and showed the booby prize. Mladilow claimed that the odds increased of selecting the correct door if the person guessing changed their original choice.
There was some interesting debate about what is predictable and what is though to have been foreseen when considering it from the retrospective position. Some of the group though the book did not quite do it! Two members of the group considered it to be a belief system that you either had faith in or you did not. This was apparent during the discussions. The book was not one you could pick and read sequentially, the chapters were not the development of a theory or a story - it was one that needed to be dipped in and out of. Although some of the annecdotes presented to represent a theory were believable and interesting to some but it left others cold.

The book on offer were:

Deadly Ambush - Raymond L Cox

Jo Nesbo - The Snowman

The Snow Geese - William Fienes

The Music Room - William Fiennes

The Man from Beijing - Henning Mankell

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

About the Author: Rebecca Skloot is the daughter of poet, novelist and essayist Floyd Skloot. She received a BSc in biological sciences and an MFA in creative nonfiction. She is a former vice president of the National Book Circle Books. She is faculty member at the yearly Mid-Atlantic Summer Creative Nonfiction. Writers Conference and has taught creative writing at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Memphis. She is also a writing mentor with the Creative Notification mentoring program.

About the Book: Henrietta Lacks was born Loretta Pleasant in August 1920 and died October 4, 1951 aged 31. She was born to a family of tobacco farmers in Ronaoke Virginia. Her family is uncertain how her name changed from Loretta to Henrietta. Eliza, her mother, died giving birth to her tenth child in 1924. Henrietta's father felt unable to handle the children, so he took them all to Clover, Virginia and distributed the children between relatives. Henrietta married her fits cousin David Lacks who had already been living with Henrietta's grandfather when she came to live there at the age of 4. They already had two children when they married in 1941 and surprised many in the family as they had been raised like brother and sister. They eventually had five children together after having moved to Maryland. Within four months of having her fifth child in Johns Hopkins Hospital in November 1950, Henrietta was diagnosed with cancer. Elsie was described by the family as "different", "deaf and dumb" and in 1955 died in the Hospital for the Negro Insane where she had been placed in 1950, around the same time Henrietta discovered that she had lumps and unusual bleeding.
She described the sensation as having a knot inside her and was eventually diagnosed at Johns Hopkins Hospital with cervical cancer. This was the only hospital in the area that treated black women. She underwent a course of treatment which involved having radium tubes sewn into her with a follow up of radium treatment at the X Ray department at a later date. During this treatment they removed without her permission, a sample of cancerous and also a sample of non cancerous tissue. Henrietta eventually died of uremic poisoning after almost a year after her initial diagnosis. She was remarkably uncomplaining whilst she underwent extensive often uncomfortable and painful treatment.

The significance of the cells that were removed were that they behaved in a unique way and continued to multiply after her death. The have continued to grow to this day and have become known as HeLa cells . They have supplied the world with tissue cells for the research and study of oncology and have been made a hugely important contribution to medical research.

The Review: Many of the group were shocked as to how her contribution to medical science has carried on without her or her families consent or knowledge. This was revealed to the family during the research into this book. Many were shocked at the exploitation of her and her family. One member of the family likened it to the family being raped. Karen said that the first 150 pages were important for science and the family history. Rolf did feel that it was a work of fiction and it had re-created stories that had grown up around it. The story of Henrietta Lacks has directly lead to the development of medical ethics and transparency in the taking of tissue samples and also contributed to the ethics within the organ transplant process.

Henrietta's family did not know about the tissue sample and the fact that it had been sold throughout the world. Ironically the family could not even afford medical insurances and had not known or benefited from the contribution that Henrietta had made. Some of the group felt that the family dynamic as told was really annoying and the region appeared to be full of people accepting their lot in life. Reference was made to the film Precious which some members of the group felt had demonstrated what happens in the slums regarding the disregard for the rights and the exploitation of individuals.

Why are these cells so productive? They are believed to contain a specific enzyme but why and how is not known.

Overall the book was considered a very important and interesting read although some felt it was overly long.

The books on offer from Rolf were:

Persian Fire - Tom Holland

The Rule of Law - Tom Bingham

Alexander the Great - Paul Cartledge

The Greatest Show on Earth - Richard Dawkins

The Drunkard's Walk - or how randomness rules our lives - Leonard Mlodinow

Uncle Petros and Goldbachs Conjecture - Apostolos Doxiadis

The groups chose The Drunkards Walk

Christie Malry's Own Double Entry by BS Johnson

About the Author - BS Johnson described as an 'experimental' writer one of many in the 60's was born to a working class family. He was evacuated out of London during the second world war. Leaving school at 16 he worked in various roles in accountancy. He studied in the evenings and learned Latin and attended a pre-university preparatory course at Birkbeck College which led to him passing the university exam for Kings College London. He achieved a 2:2 degree and went on to write novels that had some resonance of personal experience.

The Plot

Christie first takes a job at a bank as he has an interest in money and how it works as he was form a less than wealthy background. It does not live up to his expectations and studies book keeping and takes a job at Tapper's a massive cake and sweets manufacturer. He discovers Double Entry Book Keeping; debit and credit and defines this for his own purposes aggravation and recompense and keeps a book on his life. He has few friends a colleague Headlam and his love interest 'the Shrike'. He documents his aggravations and also becomes the aggressor and is convinced that no one will be interested in reading his journal. The Shrike whilst exploring Christie's body not in an erotic way, discovers a lump. He is treated but it becomes apparent that he has terminal cancer. It is almost as if there is realisation when the nurse says to him that he should not be writing about it but out there living it.

The Review

For many it was the first time that they had read BS Johnson and found it amusing and written in a style that was raw and challenging. Term challenging was used in the context of challenging the norms and the culture of writing that had prevailed through the 50's and certainly was representative of the experimentation that was taking place not only in the writing but in lifestyle. The narrative did appear to reflect the personal experience of BS Johnson and like Christie was living his life on the periphery of life itself and not feeling as if he was engaging with it as he wanted to and therefore internalised life's experiences. By not too long it had become too light as he became ill and died! Some of the group had read the other of novel by BS Johnson that had been offered by Rob 'House Mother Normal'. This novel was written in the context of a geriatric nursing home. Each chapter was dedicated to the conversation and internal dialogue of it's guests. It became apparent that as each chapter progressed each of the individuals became increasingly senile, however in a strange way more honest. It was apparent that the nurse did not enjoy her job and had little time for individual needs or conversation. This book caused more debate than the one that was selected. Johnson created his character's who were very genuine with great sensitivity and intuitively developed the internal dialogue of each of the characters and their lonely world. Discussions on the current state of social care for the elderly and very real concern about ho scenes like this could and probably do exist in geriatric nursing homes which in effect are closed communities.

The book that was selected was The Help by Kathryn Stockett

For Tibet with Love by Isabel Losada

About the Author

Isabel Losada was born in the United States and has dual British and American nationality. She is a writer and journalist. Her first published work is New Habits - published interviews with today's woman who have chosen to be a nun as a vocation.

About the Book

Isabel becomes obsessed with the injustice of Chinese occupation of Tibet since learning about the invasion in 1950. The book documents her efforts to join the exiled Tibetans at demonstration, rallies and sponsored sky dives to raise money for the cause. She eventually travels to Tibet for 14 days and during this short stay manages to negotiate her entrance through a security cordon to have a personal meeting with the Dalai Lama.

The Review

Rob said that although the book would not have been his choice he did enjoy reading it. He went on to describe his own experience of Tibet and his altitude sickness that he experienced He has also been to a vigil outside the Chinese Embassy. Although he quite enjoyed the book he found it was over long and he also questioned the credibility of some of the 'facts' that had been included as it was quite apparent that Isabel is a writer of creative non-fiction. Steve said that he quite enjoyed the book and also questioned what parts were fiction. He wondered when it was that she met with the Dalai Lama. There were interesting anecdotes and also the explanation of needing the Chinese perspective to negotiate. It was stressed that the Dalai Lama does not want independence but wants autonomy. It was also refreshing to have articulated how the different organisations associated with causes operate in different ways and pull in different directions. Rolf said that he read '7 years in Tibet' which is an autobiographical account of the experiences of an Austrian mountaineer Heinrich Harre 1944 - 1951. He wrote to Heinrich and had a letter back. He did not manage to read 'For Tibet with love'. The fact that she was in Tibet for a mere two weeks took some talent and with that comes slight disbelief although if she did obtain and audience then this took some talent. The Dalai Lama and his spiritual teachings deserve to be listened to. Mary enjoyed the book and liked the explanations. She was dismayed that so many charities exist only to raise funds to subsidise their own existence. Most of the group were humbled by the way such an insignificant person got to see the Dalai Lama , her curiosity new no bounds and there were no inner boundaries. Overall the group felt that it raised awareness but was not life changing.

The choices for this week:

The Man in the High Castle - Philip K Dick

House Mother Normal - BS Johnson

Christie Malry's Own Double Entry - BS Johnson

Mort - Terry Pratchett

The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson

About the Author

Howard Jacobson describes himself as being Jewish in mind and having Jewish intelligence although not conventionally Jewish as he does not go to shul. He was born in Manchester, educated in Whitefield and Cambridge University . He then lectured in the University of Sidney returning to teach in Selwyn College Cambridge and subsequently at Wolverhampton Polytechnic.

The plot

The main theme of the novel is about British Jewish identify and how it fits with the Gentile population in Britain. It is also about male friendship. The scene is set at a dinner party hosted by old Libor Sevick with two close friends, a failed BBC producer Julian Treslove who is also a romantic, Sam Finkler a populist Jewish philosopher. Libor Sevick and old Czech taught them both history. Libor and Sam are recently widowerd.

Sevick finds himself alone at 90 and en-wrapped in mourning for his beloved wife, the profoundness of his grief puts the two younger men's love lives into perspective. He's a warm and likable character, who faced with the temptations f a one-time film journalist remained unfailingly faithful and happy in his little European life. Sam Finkler lost his young wife to Cancer both men's relationships in contrast to Treslove who had two sons out of three short-lived dalliances.

Treslove from whose perspective the book is written is jealous of both friends' bereavement, jealous of them having had a relationship to mourn at its ending. His failing is not being able to keep a woman long enough weighs heavily. Women were bit the only mystery to him whose perspective is the core of the book, is as jealous of his friends' bereavement as he is their success. If women are a mystery to him, then so is Finkler and his faith: Jewish becomes "Finklerish".

Treslove on hi sway home stops by a

After dinner, Treslove walks back to Regent Street. He stops outside the oldest violin dealer in the country and is mugged. The mugger a woman may or not have called him a Jew. From here on in, everything is under question.

The Review

The book when selected was chosen with enthusiasm and the group were very interested as it had recently had good reviews and was much acclaimed. It transpires that only one person read the book. He thought it was intelligently written and easy to skim read. He suggested to the members of the group to take the time to read it as it was intelligent and funny. The theme of family runs deep and it seems that Treslove sees the two men as his family. What is apparent in the book is an obsession with Jews with Jewishness by half-Jewishness and non Jewishness and an apparent anti semitism with today's society. The consistent theme is that of identify which Rob being part Jewish could relate to. He said he had to let go of this and then enjoyed it. There was an interesting discussion with agreement and disagreement with the concepts. Treslove - is he Jewish or does he want to be Jewish? Why? Is it because every one at some points wants to be part of a clique. Treslove was outdone in achievement by both men and also in pain and misery.

As so often happens, when members have not read or finished a book, there is usually a strong desire to do so after the discussion, it certainly was the case after this meeting - I wonder how many did?

Steve and Deborah's Choice: -

Bearded Tit - Rory McGrath

For Tibet with Love - Isobel Losada

We are Muslim Please - Shappi Korsandi

On the Road - Jack Carowit

The book chosen was: For Tibet with Love - Isobel Losada

Now off to the Adam and Eve.

Last Rituals - Yrsa Sigurdardottir

About the Author

Yrsa Sigurðardóttir (born 1963) is an Icelandic writer, of both crime novels and children's fiction. She has been writing since 1998. Her debut crime-novel was translated into English by Bernard Scudder. The central character in the crime novels so far is Thóra Gudmundsdóttir, a lawyer.Yrsa is married with two children, and she also has a career as a civil engineer.

The Plot

In LAST RITUALS, what could have been a straightforward strangling of a young man, is made macabre by the removal of both of his eyes, and a mysterious carving on his skin. The student, Harald, is German and had been researching into witchcraft, witches, and their capture and punishment for his MA at the University of Iceland. Unlike Germany, in Iceland most of the witches were men. However, both cultures seemed to have used the same 'reference' book 'Malleus Maleficarum' or Witches Hammer. Harald was obsessed with magic, the occult, witches and this book to the extent that he had a close group of friends that formed part of a secret society dedicated to their study. Harald's drug dealing friend is arrested for the murder , however Harald's mother believes that there is something more to this murder and that the police have the wrong suspect. She hires a lawyer Thora and her colleague Matthew to investigate. The pair present a contrasting dynamic with some subtle humour and gradually the pair lift the layers on Harald's secret life and the medieval history of Iceland adding and another level of interest.

The Review.

One member of the group thought it was a cracking good read, a comment from another member of group was that there was no product placement. A protracted discussion followed about the merits or otherwise of product placement with many members of the group stating that in many cases of contemporary literature it brought credibility and currency to the novels however it was agreed that in some cases the placement of product brands was gratuitous.

One member of the group found it mediocre, the beginning was promising and interesting when they were describing the history . One member said that they had failed to find a redeeming feature in the book. The vivid description of the torture was a bit sordid and the images it created somewhat unnecessary. One member described it as a caricature of a who-dunnit, although others felt it was interesting to see why the torture took place. One member was interested and started reading it with hope as it was written by an engineer, they enjoyed the relationship between Iceland and Denmark, however the felt it had been a waste of his time and read it two days flat! One of the members found the description of the torture too much to bear as it was too close to their life's experience whilst growing up of similar events in South Africa. For that reason they did not finish it as he felt he did not need to read about it. Some members enjoyed it others felt it contained gratuitous unpleasantness.

The books on offer were:

Room by Emma Donnaghue

In a Strange Room by Damon Galgur

The Slap by Christos Tsiolkas

Red Plenty by Francis Spufferd

The Fear by Peter Godwin

The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson.

The chosen book is The Finkler Question.