We Make a Clean Sweep of The Maid

8 of us met at the Anchor Bar to discuss The Maid, by Nita Prose.

Most of us enjoyed the book and found the story interesting and somewhat believable. One Book Club member found the story too depressing to finish the book.

We found some inconsistencies with reality, such as hotel staff using the front entrance. Talking about question #7, Molly the Maid had good feelings when she entered the hotel’s front entrance to begin her workday; but Lydia pointed out that in most hotels, particularly the fancy expensive hotels such as the one in the book, staff use the back entrance only. Throughout the book, I felt that Molly was more capable and able to understand complex social cues and situations than most characters who are “on the spectrum.” Molly’s autism did trip her up a number of times, but there seemed to be a mix of her getting into trouble, as with the arrests and detainments she suffered, and her intuitively rising above difficulties, as in her relationships with Mr. Preston, the 2 Mrs. Blacks, and Juan Manwell. Also, a reader on the Goodreads website noted that the defense attorney for one of witnesses asked some questions during the trial, which is not procedural during a trial.

On discussing question #6 about the help Molly the Maid received from various hotel staff members, Lisa suggested that Mr. Preston might have been Molly’s grandfather. The history between Mr. Preston and “Gran” was discussed in the book. Although there was no specific statement of a grandfather-granddaughter relationship, references about Gran and Mr. Preston’s relationship in their youth certainly indicate a possibility that makes a lot of sense.

We talked about the dynamics in workplaces. Reminded by the book, Suzie told us that when she was a bank manager, she used to tell the tellers that they were the ‘face of the bank’ to stress their importance and responsibility. We talked about all jobs that interface with the public being important to the workplace. Marcia said that all levels of nurses are important, Patricia said everyone’s role at work is important, and Lydia mentioned the importance of custodial staff members. Everyone seemed to agree with all of these observations. Marcia noted that you could feel it when things were working well at work, just as you also noticed when there were problems.

Then, when talking more specifically about hotels and travel, we got onto a tangent about how mixing cultures within a city or state will mix general attitudes and ways people treat ‘other people’, thus leading to both pleasant and unpleasant stereotypes of visiting or living in specific places.

Another stimulating conversation for us!