SOURCE: “Siren's Wail,” in Commonweal, April 25, 1986, pp. 251-3.

In the following review, O'Brien cites flaws in the plausibility of Atwood's dystopia as depicted in The Handmaid's Tale.

I like Margaret Atwood very much, but her new novel, The Handmaid's Tale, less. It's an ambitious recasting of 1984, from a woman's point of view, positing a takeover of the United States by right-wing religious fanatics who establish a monotheocracy. Atwood sets this in the near future, time enough, she imagines, for a crisis in fertility caused by AIDS, new strains of syphilis, and poisoning by environmental and toxic hazards. As a result, the male oligarchy that runs Gilead turns all available women (divorcees, anyone married to a divorced man, or women who have lived with men) into second wives, handmaids, as long as they have “viable ovaries.” A police state enforces this polygamy and general policy with ruthless terror.

It's...