Melissa Potter

I keep going back and forth between the first three stars. As a stand-alone YA novel, it’s 2-3 stars. As a sequel to The Handmaid’s Tale, 1 star at best. As a tie-in to the Hulu series, maybe 3 stars. As a demonstration of Margaret Atwood’s literary prowess, no more than 1 for sure. As an answer to 35 years of questions, 2-3 stars if those questions kept you up at night, and needed to have a happy ending. The main issue I have is a pandering voice, as if toward YA readers. Yet these readers are especially astute and to “write-down” to them is a mistake. The two younger POV’s ( from their transcripts) as well as their friends and contemporaries, seem not only as cookie cutter tropes, but worse are nearly indistinguishable from each other. There is supposed to be nearly 10 years age difference in the two transcripts, one is 16 and the other in mid 20’s. But the timelines of the telling don’t line up. If these POV’s were told in retrospect instead of seemingly contemporaneous, I could at least try to buy the nearly identical voices. However, given that they were raised in completely different cultures erases even that stretch. If this had only been Aunt Lydia’s story, it would have worked wonderfully. However, it’s not. Also, since this was written with an eye toward the ongoing series, I can’t justify her actions. This is basically fluff written to appease a fan base, not to attain any higher goal. It’s perhaps better than some fanfics, but certainly worse than others.