June is HERE!!!!

So I really haven't read any of the assigned reading for this past month. I started "God so Loved the World", but with everything going on with Hallen have found myself doing more research than really reading. In the intrest of keeping my sanity and giving myself an outlet of our current situation... I have been doing some multitasking. Between the Logan library and the Tremonton Library there is a vast selection of books on CD. Now I don't mean to cheat and I love to read, but this allows me to feel productive and gives me something else to think about while I am doing the dishes. So I have decided to report on the book that I listened to. I had heard great reviews from some of my friends about it. The book is "The Help" by Kathryn Stockett. It takes place in Jackson Mississippi in the 60s.

Here is the synopsis:

Three ordinary women are about to take one extraordinary step.

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 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.

In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women--mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends--view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't.


This book is all about the strength of women. I thought that as strong women of faith we Merrell girls could learn a lot from the characters in this book. Not only that but it is very very well written. I absolutely loved it.


I also would like to propose that we start a non-churchy (sorry for the lack in my vocabulary at the moment) book. There are a couple murder mystery books that sound awesome. I propose any of Claire Poulsen's books. My favorite of his is "Blind". It is amazing. All of his books are great though. He is LDS and sometimes the church is mentioned but they are totally fictional.

I hope no one minds that I commented on a book that wasn't one of the chosen ones for the month. But I thought that you guys would absolutely love it.