06/20/2025
Margaret Atwood said that people wanted to know what happened after the Handmaid’s Tale and this book delivers. Set 15 years later but written almost 35 years after the fact, it is interesting to see how Atwood’s writing style changed. Her prose is definitely more efficient and modern.
Some readers were put off by the more YA feel of two of the characters, but I actually didn’t mind. 3/4 of the book was fantastic to me. But three things didn’t work and still bother me.
One is Garth and Baby Nicole, when she starts having feelings for him. They come out of the blue and felt really out of place for where they happen (especially with her guardian’s being murdered not long before). Second was them sending Baby Nicole back in as Jade. It felt too easy for her to get in there and Commander Judd being so disconnected. But the third one, it’s the one I cannot let go. When Aunt Lydia instructs the girls to leave Ardua Hall, she warns them about Aunt Vidala being always out at that time of morning. It makes no sense for Aunt Lydia to send them out then. There are a million ways to pervent that confrontation. But then it get’s worse. When Jade/Baby Nicole punches Aunt Vidala in the chest, she falls down and goes into a coma, conveniently hiding the identity of the pearl girls from anyone. The whole end felt like a rush to the finish line. A beta reader would have caught this easily. With such a great beginning, it’s too bad it had to end like this.
2025-29
