People seem to have a lot to say about this book, but I am far too bored to say very much. Briefly:
1. It’s boring. I eventually skipped all but Minnie’s chapters (the only interesting narrator and also the only interesting plot arc), so you could say I read [1/2 +1/3 = 5/6] of this book, which is ½ too much.
2. Everyone is pretty noxious except for (a) black people and (b) white people who literally have To Kill a Mockingbird on their nightstand. Eyeroll please. I wasn’t around in the 1960’s, but I’d guess that non-racists then were pretty much like non-meat-eaters now: highly uncommon outside of intellectual bastions and sometimes irritatingly self-righteous. (You know that future generations will judge us harshly for the factory farms.)
3. I cannot suspend my disbelief. Celia, the upjumped cracker girl, can’t even conceive of treating Minnie as anything other than an equal?! I don’t pull out the interobang often, but I pull it out here. Nobody clings to racial hierarchy more than poor members of the dominant ethnicity – it’s the only thing they have. How can Stockett grow up in the South and not notice that phenomenon?
4. The lavender-and-gold cover design just makes me think “urine-soaked wedding,” and I cannot deal.
In conclusion, why are we even talking about this book?
Living by Fiction 