Happy Birthday, Margaret Atwood

Happy Birthday to Margaret Atwood, celebrated Canadian novelist, poet and essayist! Atwood has won numerous awards—the Booker (twice), the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the Governor General's Award—and is co-founder of the Griffin Poetry Prize and the Writers' Trust of Canada. Her most cataloged book on LibraryThing is The Handmaid's Tale, which has been adapted into an award-winning television series.

Have you read her work? What are some of your favorites?

She’s one of my favorite authors! Some of my favorites are Alias Grace, Oryx and Crake, The Robber Bride, and The Blind Assassin.

Although I haven't read her most famous book (The Handmaid's Tale), what Atwood I have read has made a very strong impression on me. Her novel Cat's Eye is the best evocation of certain elements of girlhood social dynamics that I have ever read. Her short story, "Death by Landscape," in the collection Wilderness Tips, is one of my favorite short stories, right up there with Melville's Bartleby the Scrivener.

This year I read Margaret Atwood's short My Evil Mother, it was funny with a nice twist, and has a lot less bite than Penelopiad, which I've read twice.

She is a bit hit and miss with me, but some hits are The Robber Bride, The Blind Assassin, The Handmaid's Tale and Oryx and Crake. She is a creative force.

I have read 5 of her books and loved them all but probably The Handmaid's Tale is my favorite.

I read and thoroughly admired The Penelopiad. This was after seeing a ripping good staging at Santa Monica's City Garage Theatre in late 2022. Need to read more Atwood.