Common Sense Media Review
By Barbara Schultz
,
based on child development research. How do we rate?
Brilliant, violent sequel is worthy of the orginal.
Parents Need to Know
Why Age 16+?
Any Positive Content?
Where to Read
What's the Story?
THE TESTAMENTS is author Margaret Atwood's sequel to her bestselling novel The Handmaid's Tale. It picks up more than a decade after The Handmaid's Tale ends, and takes readers back inside the Republic of Gilead, the oppressive society that the former United States of America has become. As in the first novel, men and women are divided by gender, function, and caste, and girls are given little education. Instead, they are raised to be obedient and to fear men; they are taught that their voluminous dresses and subdued behavior will protect them from being defiled. The men in charge are called Commanders, while women may serve as wives, Handmaids (who bear Commanders' children when wives can't), Marthas (who do housework), or chaste Aunts, who safeguard laws, records, and education. Events mainly concern the daughters of a former Handmaid and the roles they have to play in exposing the cruelty and corruption within Gilead. The girls long to be reunited with their biological mother, who fled Gilead in the first novel, though they don't know where she is or even if she's still alive. They're assisted by Mayday, a resistance group with members in Canada and inside Gilead. Like The Handmaid's Tale, The Testaments is a scathing indictment of societal forces that purport to protect people but actually oppress them. It encourages readers to question authority, and to value freedom over safety.
Is It Any Good?
This chilling sequel about a dystopian society that oppresses women and girls is a page turner that's a worthy followup to the original novel. To readers who have read The Handmaid's Tale, or watched the film or award-winning Hulu TV series, the world of Gilead will be a known quantity, so The Testaments may not have the same shock value that its precursor did when it was new. However, this book may be even more engaging for teen readers, as two of the main characters are young adults. And it will make teens think about issues affecting women and gender roles. Author Margaret Atwood is brilliant at creating her complex, threatening, dystopian world, while still grounding her characters in the most essential values of family and freedom.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the lives of women in Gilead as portrayed in The Testaments. How are they protected and how are they threatened? How do the laws of Gilead work for and against women?
Whom do you admire in the novel, and why? What character strengths do they show?
What do you think of the violence in The Testaments? Is it essential to the story or too much? How does reading violence on the page compare with seeing it on-screen?
Book Details
- Author :
- Genre : Literary Fiction
- Topics : Family Stories ( Siblings ) , Friendship
- Book type : Fiction
- Publisher : Nan A. Talese
- Publication date : September 10, 2019
- Publisher's recommended age(s) : 0 - 0
- Number of pages : 432
- Available on : Paperback, Nook, Audiobook (unabridged), Hardback, Apple Books, Kindle
- Last updated : September 29, 2025
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