I do not only love this book because I am a woman. I don't only love it because its prescience astounds me. More than a seminal feminist work, it is a narrative of widespread oppression. It gives voice to any person deprived of personhood by the politics of sex. As bill after bill is brought before congress legislating the proper use of mine and others' bodies, I hand this book to you and ask that you read it with your future and your children's futures in mind. We live in extremely dangerous times. How will you live through them? When you cannot choose how to use your own body, how will you find agency?
— SarahSet in the near future, it describes life in what once was the United States, now called the Republic of Gilead. Reacting to social unrest, and a sharply declining birthrate, the new regime has reverted to -- even gone beyond -- the repressive tolerance of the original Puritans. Offred is a Handmaid who may leave the home of the Commander and his wife once a day to walk to food markets whose signs are now pictures instead of words because women are no longer allowed to read. She must lie on her back once a month and pray that the Commander makes her pregnant because she is only valued as long as her ovaries are viable. Offred can remember the years before, when she lived and made love with her husband, Luke; when she played with and protected her daughter; when she had a job, money of her own, and access to knowledge. But all of that is gone now.
Funny, unexpected, horrifying, and altogether convincing, The Handmaid's Tale is at once scathing satire, dire warning, and tour de force.