The Handmaid's Tale
Cut along the dashed lines and pass the cards around the table.
Where did you do most of your reading of this one, and did you need a blanket, a snack, or a break halfway through?
The narrator notices tiny physical comforts (a warm bath, butter on skin, sunlight on a floor). Which small comfort in your own daily life would you miss most?
Offred holds onto scraps of her old life like treasures. What scrap of your own past (a smell, a song, a kitchen) came back to you while reading?
So much of this book is about being watched. Was there a moment where you exhaled a little, where the story let you feel safe or soft for a page or two?
Atwood writes women who find each other in whispers and glances. Who in your life would be the person you'd risk a whisper for?
The color red follows the handmaids everywhere. How did reading all that red make you feel, and did any other color in the book feel like relief?
This book asks what a person holds onto when almost everything is taken. Without giving anything away, what did you decide Offred was really keeping alive inside herself?
Atwood has said she included nothing that had not happened somewhere in real life. Did that change how the book sat with you, and did you find anything in it that felt hopeful rather than only frightening?