Margaret Atwood is Canada's most eminent novelist, poet and critic. Her books include The Edible Woman, Surfacing, Lady Oracle, Life Before Man, Bodily Harm, The Handmaid's Tale (winner of both the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Science Fiction and the Governor-General's Award, shortlisted for the Booker Prize and made in a major film). Cat's Eye (also shortlisted for the Booker Prize) The Robber Bride and Alias Grace. Finally, The Blind Assassin won the Booker Prize in 2000.

NOW A SMASH-HIT CHANNEL 4 TV SERIES

WITH A NEW INTRODUCTION FROM MARGARET ATWOOD

The Republic of Gilead offers Offred only one function: to breed. If she deviates, she will, like dissenters, be hanged at the wall or sent out to die slowly of radiation sickness. But even a repressive state cannot obliterate desire – neither Offred's nor that of the two men on which her future hangs.

Brilliantly conceived and executed, this powerful vision of the future gives full rein to Margaret Atwood's irony, wit and astute perception.

‘Don’t expect to be gripped by a more potent or involving drama this year.’ Telegraph

'I can’t think of another television event that has hit quite such a nerve, and gone on resounding and resonating, worrying and creeping into your soul and into your dreams quite like The Handmaid’s Tale has … It’s as relevant today as it was when Atwood wrote it, in Berlin, in 1985. And while all this continues to be real, we need The Handmaid’s Tale – to keep reminding, and resonating, and ringing. Dong, dong, dong.’ Guardian