The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood

from goodreads

2.5 stars

It is interesting how when you are forced to read a book, like in high school, you either love it and it expands your world or you hate it and it closes off your world a little bit. There is usually no middle ground. The loves and the hates are very intense. I liked most of the books I had to read in high school. I really enjoyed Lord of the Flies. I really disliked The Stone Angel. A friend of mine was required to read Wuthering Heights at her high school and she did not appreciate it at all. When I read it in university (for pleasure) I really liked it and couldn't understand why she hated it so viscerally.

The Handmaid's Tale falls into this kind of category. Many have read it as part of their high schooling. People either love it or hate it. I had a small inkling of what it was going to be about going into it but had no idea how the tale was told. I mostly read it to see what all the fuss was about and try to figure out why it made such a stir with those who read it in school.

Do you have books like that from your required reading days?

Synopsis

Through the eyes of Offred we learn of an America that has been turned on its head. Women who have viable ovaries are now "handmaids" who live in the houses of high ranking officials in their society. Their only purpose is to breed.

My Thoughts

Well to me this was kind of a blah book. While it is well written, and at the time was rather avant garde, it just didn't do it for me. I found it rather slow and boring until near the end.

I guess it needed to be slow and boring so we could understand what Offred was going through, how boring her days were. How alone she really was. I just wished there was some sort of action or more questions explained. And the jumping between timelines was sometimes confusing.

It was interesting to think of what a religious state would look like in the United States. How totally conservative it would become and how people would need to start changing their ways. What I thought was really interesting was how there were tourists that would come around the town. Its like the U.S. went back in time with the way they were dressed and did things, yet the rest of the world was still modern and progressive. It was an interesting juxtaposition.

The ending was kind of weird. You kind of wanted to know more about what happened to her. Did she ever find her family? Was she able to escape and be happy? What about the others?

So this book just wasn't for me. I can understand why people like it but I just couldn't get my head space there to fully appreciate it.