本書為電影封面大眾平裝版。
★不到一年銷量突破4百萬冊！
★《紐約時報》2009年度暢銷榜第二名，僅次於丹．布朗《失落的符號》
★《紐約時報》2009年度暢銷榜第二名，僅次於丹．布朗《失落的符號》
我們只是兩個人，我倆之間並沒有那麼多不同。遠遠不如我們想像中的不同。
1962年美國南方密西西比州。23歲白人女孩史基特剛從大學畢業返鄉，她夢想成為作家，但她的母親認為一椿好婚事才是女人的依歸。史基特從小由女傭帶大，女傭是她傾訴心事的好朋友，然而這次回來女傭也失蹤了，沒有人知道去向。
機靈能幹，內斂沉著，曾帶大十七個白人小孩的53歲黑傭愛比琳，在兒子兩年前因雇主疏忽而意外死亡後，她的內心世界起了變化，她在史基特的朋友李佛太太家當幫傭，照顧兩歲的小女孩。
黑傭米妮，是愛比琳最好的朋友，矮小肥胖，廚藝了得，除了一身潑辣性格使她時常丟工作，一直到鎮上新來一戶人家才讓她找到幫傭之職。新來的漂亮女主人對待米妮如同姊妹，只是女主人看似心事重重還行跡可疑，鎮上的其他女士也不歡迎她。
某日，史基特的朋友希莉起草一份衛生計畫，她恐於黑人身上帶有病毒，建議為幫傭另蓋廁所。對此感到不平的史基特，決意著手一個謂為大膽的寫作計畫：採訪黑傭在白人家庭的工作甘苦，並寫成一本書……
愛比琳、米妮，和善良的史基特、接二連三的黑人遭虐事件，以及一個「幫傭專用廁所」事件，使得這些女人在保守的60年代不分黑白地首次相聚：黑傭訴說人 生，白女孩記錄並改造故事。像發動寧靜革命，也像是拋磚引玉，有越來越多黑傭透過她們願意說出故事，在膚色黑白分明、道德黑白卻模稜兩可的年代，她們的相 遇是民權運動發生前黑與白間搭起的最初橋梁。或許是真的，不管有多麼危險，「這本書」真能順利出版，讓她們的聲音被世人聽見……
中譯本《姊妹》由「商周」出版。
Be prepared to meet three unforgettable women:
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.
