Book review: ‘The Blind Assassin’ by Margaret Atwood

Gulf Today Report

Since her debut onto the literary scene in 1961, Margaret Atwood has become one of the most internationally popular and lauded authors.

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Following a series of poetry collections throughout the Sixties, the Canadian author published her first novel, The Edible Woman, in 1969 – an early example of the feminist themes threading through her stories and poems, according to the Independent.

Owing to the success of the 2017 screen adaption of her dystopian, feminist novel, “The Handmaid’s Tale,” Atwood has reached an even wider audience in recent years.

Winner of the 2000 Man Booker prize, the judges rightfully praised Atwood’s 10th novel, The “Blind Assassin,” as “far reaching, dramatic and structurally superb.” Showing Atwood’s technical capabilities, the novel contains three stories in-one with the overarching narration of the elderly Iris Chase Griffen.

Looking back over her life and in particular, her relationship with her sister Laura, the novel focuses on the events preceding Laura’s premature death as well as literary status posthumously awarded for a scandalous novel. A story of family intrigue, betrayal and romance set against the background of 1930s and Forties Canada, the tome concludes with a satisfying twist that demonstrates just how good a storyteller Atwood is.