Given the level of hype surrounding this book, I went in skeptical but still came out shell-shocked. I am a huge fan of speculative dystopian novels (especially those in the vein of Octavian Butler), and Margaret Atwood provides the reader with an insightful look at the dangers of complacency.

The main character is someone you could describe a regular person with no desires to stand out or rock the boat. Then a regime roles in that strips her and others of so many fundamental rights. She hopes for change, but does not march, does not protest, and generally complies with the newly imposed status-quo. There is no fundamental character arch where she becomes the change she wants to see in the world, and that is perhaps what makes this haunting narrative so believable.

The main character's latter interaction with Moira, was especially fascinating. While at her core Moira is a feminist lesbian who lives to stick it to the man, even in Gilead she too has been beaten down. Offred exacerbates, "I don't want her to be like me. Give in, go along, save her skin. That is what it comes down to. I want gallantry from her, swash-buckling, heroism, single-handed combat. Something I lack."

Most readers hope for these very morals and values in their main characters, but real people are complex, contradictory, messy, and far from heroic. Most people want to live in a society with the benefits of civil rights hard fought by "social justice warriors," without having to themselves put in the work or potentially end up conveyed as a radical dissenter.

Complacency is dangerous; we cannot just expect other, better people to safeguard our own civil rights. In this day and age, given the rise of xenophobic populism, no one should settle for complacency.