It's been almost five years since I wrote my review. I've rewritten large parts of it for clarity. The main idea remains the same.Extremist Judeo-Christian beliefs have won America's culture war. Now women have no rights. They are slaves to men and the biblical, patriarchal society in which they live. The Handmaid's Tale is the first-person account of one of these enslaved women.Massachusetts Turns Into Saudi Arabia?More than thirty years have passed since The Handmaid's Tale was first published [...]

7/7/17 I'm just going to leave this here. fuck Paul Ryan. but not literally, ew. Sleeveless women? My stars and garters!03/31/17. So, this Russia thing. Am I right?2/5/17just another giant step towards making this book a reality, like they always dreamed of.Original review written in 2o12:WARNING: This review is being written after I worked a 13 hour day, with another one on the horizon tomorrow, and a glass of wine and while watching the Rachel Maddow show. Current events have put this book on [...]

I guess Atwood doesn't believe in quotation marks I don't think I've ever come across a novel yet in which there is no distinction between the narrator and the character. It took me quite a while to get used to that type of style of writing. I had to go back and re-read sentences again and again, which doesn't really lend itself to a relaxing reading experience, and it slowed me down quite a bitFirst 100 pages:Really annoyingwhy? well because I felt like a juicy bone was being waved in front of [...]

There are only a small handful of books that have affected me in a REALLY personal way. In a way that I always try to put into words and always, ultimately, fail. I have read a lot of books over the years and I've liked many, disliked plenty too, loved and hated a smaller amount but out of the thousands I've read, there's less than ten - maybe even less than five, now I think about it - that honestly hit me so hard that I would go so far as to say they changed me.The Handmaid's Tale is a book th [...]

(edited from a paper I wrote in college about the book)In 1986, when Margaret Atwood published The Handmaid’s Tale, Ronald Regan had declared “Morning in America,” and society was going to renew itself by returning to the old values. The Christian right, in its infancy at the time, was rising in reaction to the Free Love, and the horrors of AIDs. The 1984 election gave us Willie Horton, and a reminder about how violent and evil society had become. Finally, even though Chernobyl happened sh [...]

Anyone else loving the television adaptation at the moment?Sure, they’ve played around with the plot a little and padded a few things out, but I think they’ve captured the essence of this book in all its brutal reality. Certainly, worth a watch! Book ReviewI’ve been moved by books in the past, many times, but I’ve never before read a book that has emotionally drained me to such a degree. This is frightening and powerful. And sometimes it only takes a single paragraph to make you realise [...]

Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale is a tale of terror as well as a warning. The dystopian future she describes in "Gilead" which appears to be centered in Boston (due to the reference to Mass Ave and the town of Salem) is chillingly misogynistic where women are reduced to strict categories: Martha for housework and cooking, Jezebels (easy to guess, right?), Eyes, Angels (soldiers for the state), infertile Wives and potentially fertile Handmaids. It is beautifully written with lots of flashba [...]

Everyone seems to like getting scared from time to time. We sometimes like to read, or watch movies and shows about natural disasters, psychopaths, monsters, zombies, and vampires. However, we like our scary stuff to be fictional and temporary. Watching "Battle Royale"? Awesome. Watching the news about a real murderous dictator on CNN? Not awesome but just as scary. "The Handmaid's Tale" is guaranteed to terrify you—both in a fun, entertaining way and in a viscerally upsetting, too-close-to-ho [...]

Consider this not a ground-breaking work of literature. Consider this not a piece of fiction boasting an avant-garde mode of narration. Consider it not a commentary on the concept of subjugation of the weak by the ones holding the reins. Consider it not a thinly veiled feminist diatribe either.Instead, consider The Handmaid's Tale an almost physical experience. Consider Margaret Atwood a fearless deliverer of unpleasant news - a messenger unafraid of dishing out the bone-chilling, cruel, unalter [...]

What a perfect time to be scared to death by this novel. It doesn't feel dated or far-fetched at all, thanks to President Trump.Claire Danes is a pretty good match for this narrative.Original reviewImagine the near future where power is overtaken by the religious right under the guise of protection from Islamic terrorism. Imagine the future where the roles of the women reduced to those assigned to them in Old Testament - they are no longer allowed to read, work, own property, or handle money. Im [...]

I. NightI am lying awake in my bed. I keep my eyes closed and beg sleep to come. Fruitlessly! Outside, the rain is whipping the windows without mercy. My husband is sleeping next to me, oblivious to my struggle. I need my thoughts to go away. I need to forget that I just finished the Handmaid's Tale and its effect on me. I knew I should have resumed myself to the self-imposed daily quota of 10%. But no. I had to read the last 30 % in one go and now I can't sleep because of it. It’s like a shot [...]

A true dystopian classic. This is incredibly well written, & I think that is why it's fan base is so enormous & faithful. It made Entertainment Weekly's "Top 25 Best Books of the Last 25 Years."The account reminds me of, and is probably written trying to somehow emulate, "The Diary of Anne Frank." This new vision of the future is one devoid the female mystique, with only one sex becoming triumphant &) dominating the other. This is misogyny to the nth degree. It is a holocaust that mi [...]

After reading 'The Handmaid's Tale', I can see why this dystopian classic has made such an impression on so many. This is a book that definitely hangs with you, haunting your thoughts, long after you finish the book. It is thought-provoking and terrifying.The story centers on the heroine, Offred, who is a "handmaiden" in this futuristic world created by Ms. Atwood. As a handmaiden, Offred's sole purpose is to produce a baby for the Commander and his wife, Serena Joy. Once she has served her purp [...]

Not a very well written book. The writing itself is clumsy. It doesn't feel like you're reading a story; it feels like you're reading a piece of writing. Good writers put their words together for a calculated effect, but Atwood's words aren't just calculated-- they're contrived. In a good piece of writing, you shouldn't see the writer at all. You shouldn't see the structure of their writing. All you should see is the story. If you're seeing the deliberate cadence of a phrase, or the use of repet [...]

Don't let the bastards grind you down.There's a lot of talk about women's rights these days. There were times where I thought: enough already. You girls got it good. I looked around me and saw women with strong voices and a million choices. If they wished to go for a career, they could go for it. If they didn't, no biggie. Their liberty seemed greater than men's in a lot of respects. The power they wield over men is magnificent and often described as the greatest humanity is capable of: a woman' [...]

The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood is a brilliant, endearing, scary as hell book. Told with simplistic prose and stark attention to detail, Atwood describes life in the not too distant future where the United States has been transformed through military coup into a totalitarian theocracy. This dystopian horror story is made all the more real by the bridge Atwood has created between the world we know now and the world that could be – the story’s protagonist remembers the time before the [...]

I would love to write a lengthy review for this book. But I can't. Because I'm so emotionally drained after reading it that it's a miracle I'm not still hiding underneath a pile of blankets, sobbing. This is by no means an easy read, but I think it's a book that everyone needs to read. This review can also be found at The Alliterates.

Terrifying! But SO good!Update in Year One Of Dystopia: As long as you are allowed and capable to read, please do read this novel! In an era when politicians in the Western world are not ashamed to refer to pregnant women as "hosts", deprived of their rights as individuals, we must start speaking up against the steady realisation of dystopian fiction. Let these authors, such as Orwell, Atwood, or Ishiguro, stay great writers of fiction! Don't make them involuntary prophets!If we don't oppose the [...]

The Handmaid's Tale portrays a terrifying but very real and possible dystopia. At first, it's difficult to tell what exactly is going on in the handmaid's world, although her spare narration is filled with a deep sense of fear and danger. It's challenging but exciting to try to make sense of all the frightening details that she describes, and that's one of the things that made this such a compelling read for me--I was desperate to figure out what was happening as well as how and why things had g [...]

I don't even know where to start with this book??I was not able to connect with the Characters in the book at all. It was a task to completely finish this book at all.I know I am in the minority, but I don't know what all the hype was with this book. I think that Atwood was long winded in her writing style and did not help with the connections with the Characters. I honestly don't have much more to say about this book.

An interesting book to read right now for a couple of reasons. One, I just finished 1984 and it was very much a world like the one in 1984. Two, the storyline closely reflects the fears of the current political climate in America.It is hard to say that a story like this is "great" as that has a positive connotation. I was very enthralling, but terrifying at the same time. As a man, I don't think this story has as deep of an impact on me as it would if I was a woman. If you like dystopian, you mu [...]

EDIT 02/06/2016: Lowering the rating to two. I finished it more than a week ago and now I realized I haven't thought of it once. It really left me nothing."Better never means better for everyone, he says. It always means worse, for some."I used to think of my reading taste as predictable. Well, at least a very specific part of my reading taste: namely, there are very few things in the world that I love more than I love dyostopias in the style of 1984 and, above any other, Brave New World (seriou [...]

Tan duro que no podía leer más de diez páginas diarias. Era incapaz. P.D Si no hubiese machitos escocíos con este libro, entonces significaría que Margaret no lo hizo bien.

Υπέροχο και σκληρό βιβλίο,αμιγώς προειδοποιητικό για τον κίνδυνο που διατρέχει κάθε κοινωνία η οποια βρίσκεται σε πλήρη ηθική,ανθρωπιστική και οικονομική κρίση. Επομένως,πρέπει να διαβαστεί απο όλους τις Έλληνες!!Επίκαιρο και ταιριαστό στην νέα τάξη πραγμάτων που μας υπο [...]

If 1984 is the father, The Handmaid’s Tale is the mother. They are both in the same category and yet they are different. The Handmaid’s Tale is more feminine. It revolves around Offred’s drama, unlike 1984, which revolves more around the ideology (more like a battle between Winston’s ideas and O’Brien’s ideas).*I’ve read it with the shittiest combination of rage, sadness, fear and paranoia, which stuck with me throughout the entire book. I don’t easily get this emotional. But let [...]

In the near future, the rights of women have been stripped away and the fertile ones become Handmaids and are assigned to upper class men. Offred remembers the time before and knows there must be a way out of the hell men have createdOnce upon a time, I dated a woman whose favorite writer was Margaret Atwood and she passed along this book for me to read. Frankly, I was pretty impressed with the dystopian tale but found it a little far-fetched at the time. Now, in the later part of 2017, it feels [...]

My preparedness for the regime change taking place in the United States--with elements of the Electoral College, the Kremlin and the FBI helping to install a failed business promoter who the majority of American voters did not support in the election--continues with The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood. Rereading this 1985 novel was a metric for me. My first attempt, shortly after joining , led to me abandoning the book, which ebbs and flows on mood and language and prompts the reader to fill [...]

THIS BOOKS ABOUT ORGIES AND PEOPLE WHO LIKE ORGIES AND SOME PEOPLE WHO H8 ORGIES.

Offred is a frightening character. The future where she lives is dystopian, but the word doesn't do justice to this book's plot. Among all the dystopian fictions I've reade.g Matched by Ally Condie, Delirium by Lauren Olivier, or going back even more, The Chrysalids by John Wyndham, none is as scary as Offred's world.The story elements lean towards women, because the main character is a woman. But it's so much more than that. It affects pro-choice people. It affects the romantics who draw inspir [...]

Zombies currently dominate the dystopian landscape, but back when Margaret Atwood published this (1985) Orwell’s 1984 was still in the rear view mirror, yet ever on the horizon, and Communism was still around, so Atwood had an “evil” totalitarian empire to model her fictional one after. Today, as our civil liberties are getting slowly whittled away, is Atwood’s maybe-a-future-of-zombies-wouldn’t-be-so-bad tale prescient?Maybe.Ask someone real smart.A spoilerish overview: The proliferat [...]