The Handmaid's Tale

By: Margaret Atwood

Narrated by: Claire Danes

Length: 11 hrs and 1 min

Publisher's summary

Audie Award, Fiction, 2013

Margaret Atwood's popular dystopian novel The Handmaid's Tale explores a broad range of issues relating to power, gender, and religious politics. Multiple Golden Globe award-winner Claire Danes (Romeo and Juliet, The Hours) gives a stirring performance of this classic in speculative fiction, one of the most powerful and widely read novels of our time.

After a staged terrorist attack kills the President and most of Congress, the government is deposed and taken over by the oppressive and all-controlling Republic of Gilead. Offred, now a Handmaid serving in the household of the enigmatic Commander and his bitter wife, can remember a time when she lived with her husband and daughter and had a job, before she lost even her own name. Despite the danger, Offred learns to navigate the intimate secrets of those who control her every move, risking her life in breaking the rules in hopes of ending this oppression.

Cover Art by Fred Marcellino. Used with permission of Pippin Properties, Inc.

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©1985 Margaret Atwood (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

“Claire Danes sparkles in this performance…Danes’s Offred is complex, and her flashes of intense strength highlight her vulnerability. This is a consuming listen, thanks to Danes’s emotional subtleties.” (AudioFile)

Government Control through fear...it could happen!

This book was both amazing and completely horrifying to me! As a woman, mother, wife and daughter I could really relate with the main character Offred (the Handmaid). This book was a real game-changer for me. I will never look at the world again with the same eyes. This is an absolute literary masterpiece and I am so glad it was available on Audible. This is a MUST READ for everyone!
Claire Danes is magnificent as the narrator. I can't envision anyone else doing it. Just superb!

Riveting, even without a plot

There is no story to this book. Yet I would not call it episodic or slice of life. It is a tour de force stream of consciousness telling of what the world might be like under certain circumstances. It is securely anchored in the concerns of the 1980s, when it was written, but it is just as valid here in 2013, when some of the issues have shifted but the polarization is if anything worse than it was. It's not giving anything away to say that the book describes a reactionary dystopia where women's rights have been revoked. One of the interesting things Atwood does is invert what you would expect as a consequence of that. The female characters, bad and good, are still depicted as actual human beings. The male characters, for the most part, are mere automatons blindly serving the reactionary regime. I think this is Atwood's subtle way of pointing out that men as well as women are the victims of the repressive system that has taken power. There are a couple things I wish I could say about the ending but I will restrain myself. One thing I have to say is that it ends with one of the most beautiful paragraphs in all of literature.

In a word...Disturbing

I cant say I hated this book, but I finished it and felt sad. I did however finish it in two days, so it was interesting. It was not wrapped up as well as you wish it would be in the end, sort of a gone with the wind finish...you find yourself making up what might of happened after the end.
It did have some negative religious undertones, and I am a Christian but it was not too offensive. It was difficult to listen to as a mother of a five year old girl, there were parts where I wept thinking about being forcibly separated from my daughter.
I gave this book a 4 since I was interested in it till the end, even though the subject matter was difficult. I would recommend this book if you interested in thinking about the "what if's" of a dystopian society. Truthfully, if we look at some of the things we as a society of people have done to each other in the past this scenario is not so far fetched.

Absolutely OUTSTANDING

First- full disclosure: I'm a fan of the book. I'd read it just a few years after it came out when I was probably a freshman in high school; it made an indelible impression on me and I think Margaret Atwood is a flippin' GENIUS. I think it should be required reading for every human being in North America.

My daughter, in her mid-teens, loves audiobooks. She is a great reader as well; however, she will only very occasionally take a book recommendation from her mum. I got this audiobook in the hopes that she *might* listen to it if I put it on her iPod.

Claire Danes hasn't been a favorite of mine - it isn't that I *don't* like her.....I just missed "my So-Called Life" age wise & I can't recall seeing her in anything since "Romeo & Juliet" (I haven't watched much tv since 1997). I was skeptical if Ms. Danes could do this material (that's so important to me) justice, but I hoped my daughter would enjoy it.....

One evening I couldn't sleep & I had no more credits so I decided to give it a try - AMAZING. I hadn't re-read "The Handmaid's Tale" in 20+ years and listening to it again now was not only chilling but I was dumbfounded at Atwood's prescience (just check out Ms. magazines' recent articles about the War against Women). And Claire Danes? She inhabits this narrative, gives such a strong, nuanced performance that I cannot BELIEVE she didn't win the Audie for this. Danes reading Atwood is a golden example of how audiobooks can be so much better than reading a book yourself; great writing paired with great reading is sublime.

I still don't know if my daughter has listened to it - I pray that she does. HIGHEST RECOMMENDATION POSSIBLE

Finally at Audible

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

Could this be where we are going?

Any additional comments?

Great to get some of the very best books of recent times to the Audible catalog.

BORING‼️‼️

OMG‼️. I’m a retired English professor, and I found this book to be one of the worst books I have ever read or heard. There was no plot, no climax and no conclusion! I’m a woman who enjoys action and adventure. The most action here was in the brothel. Thank goodness for Claire Danes! At least she can perform well. I almost quit listening three or four times, but I kept thinking it would get better; it didn’t! The story is just a quirky twist on a tired subject - we poor women are always trod upon. Blah, blah, blah.

It’s time for me to go read some Connelly, Patterson or Hurwitz. Enough of this drivel!

Confused

I had a really hard time with this one because I guess I missed how these people ended up where they were...it didn't get explained until the very end. It was very frustrating for me.

Loved it

If you could sum up The Handmaid's Tale in three words, what would they be?

I listened to this one several times. Claire Daines is a wonderful narrator.

Any additional comments?

Listen to it

Incredible

I was urged to read this 20 years ago but didn't think it would appeal. I was very much mistaken. I can now fully understand why this is on so many "must read" lists. Danes narration is superb and perfectly cast.

eery

Makes one think, in lieu of how the world is becoming less educated, more resistant to scientific facts and pushing for religious Vinton of the rest of us. Would we allow this to happen by shear laziness like a thump on the head? Who would fight it? Good book to push one forward to think.