Reading Order
The Blind Assassin Reading Order
Margaret Atwood's The Blind Assassin (2000) is the Booker Prize-winning novel in which Iris Chase, at eighty-two, narrates the story of her life and the death of her sister Laura, while a novel-within-the-novel — ostensibly written by Laura — unfolds a science fiction story told between two unnamed lovers. A puzzle box of nested narratives (memoir, newspaper clippings, the novel-within-the-novel, the science fiction tale within that), it is Atwood's most formally elaborate achievement and one of the most structurally intricate novels of the early twenty-first century.
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The Blind Assassin
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The Blind Assassin
Margaret Atwood·2000·Stand-alone — no prior Atwood required. Booker Prize winner. Atwood's other major novels include The Handmaid's Tale (1985), Alias Grace (1996), and Cat's Eye (1988).
The Blind Assassin — Frequently Asked Questions
What is The Blind Assassin about?
The Blind Assassin begins with Iris Chase's announcement that her sister Laura drove off a bridge ten days after the end of World War II. Iris, now eighty-two, narrates the story of their lives — their family's decline, their marriages, the Depression and war years — while a novel titled The Blind Assassin, ostensibly written by Laura and published after her death, provides a second narrative: two unnamed lovers meeting in secret, telling each other science fiction stories about a city where blind slave assassins are trained. The three narratives — memoir, novel, science fiction tale within the novel — interlock to reveal the true story of Laura's death.
Is The Blind Assassin hard to read?
The Blind Assassin is structurally intricate — three nested narratives require patience to untangle, and the full picture only becomes clear near the end of the novel. Most readers find the puzzle-box structure highly rewarding rather than frustrating: Atwood plants clues throughout, and the revelation of how the pieces connect is one of the most satisfying structural payoffs in contemporary literary fiction. Readers who enjoy Alias Grace and The Handmaid's Tale will find The Blind Assassin more complex but equally rich.
How does The Blind Assassin fit in Margaret Atwood's reading order?
Most readers come to The Blind Assassin after The Handmaid's Tale (1985), which is Atwood's most widely read novel and usually the recommended starting point. Alias Grace (1996), Cat's Eye (1988), and The Robber Bride (1993) are all excellent introductions to Atwood's historical fiction mode; The Blind Assassin can be read at any point but makes more sense in the context of her career's interests in female survival, family history, and unreliable female narrators.
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