Offred is a Handmaid in the Republic of Gilead. She has 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. About The Author Margaret Atwood is Canada´s most eminent novelist, poet and critic. Her books include The Edible Woman, Surfacing, Lady Oracle, Alias Grace, Cat´s Eye, which was short-listed for the Booker Prize and The Handmaid´s Tale, which won both the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Science Fiction and the Governor-General´s Award, was short-listed for the Booker Prize and made into a major film. She lives in Toronto with the writer Graeme Gibson and their daughter.