An interesting book. Not one I necessarily enjoyed, but definitely interesting.

I’ll confess her use of the name of Gilead put me off a bit. The concept of a biblical kingdom of that name has certainly been used before, nothing new.

I also had trouble pinning down the age of Offred to start with. As the book went on it became clearer, but I liked that uncertainty to begin with. It fit in very well with the Handmaid’s situation, protected, in a way, like the daughters in white, like the overgrown school girls she mentions.

I’ve read one of Margaret Atwood’s books before: Cat’s Eye. It was one of the books I studied at university. I noticed some repeated themes between the two, the idea of falling women, the study of feminism.

I liked The Handmaid’s Tale much better though. Although she deals very well with the psychology of trauma in it, it isn’t as blatant as in Cat’s Eye, which was actually quite distressing for me to read.

She uses the same level of detail, which I enjoyed very much. I felt it gave it a comfortable feeling, I could relax into it and really see what was happening.

Her use of symbolism (of which she is most definitely a master) was a bit more clumsy though. Perhaps understandable, given The Handmaid’s Tale is a much earlier book.