When Eugenia “Skeeter” Phelan returns to her hometown of Jackson, Mississippi fresh from college with a diploma, her mother dismisses it as “a pretty piece of paper.” And so the novel THE HELP truly begins, for its Skeeter’s story that drives the pages. It’s the age old story of a child now grown, still hoping to appease an unyielding parent. In this case Charlotte Phelan, who in Skeeter’s eyes is pretty, petite, in short everything a Southern belle should be while Skeeter is not.