The Blind Assassin

By: Margaret Atwood

Narrated by: Margot Dionne

Length: 18 hrs and 27 mins

Publisher's summary

Margaret Atwood takes the art of storytelling to new heights in a dazzling new novel that unfolds layer by astonishing layer and concludes in a brilliant and wonderfully satisfying twist.

For the past twenty-five years, Margaret Atwood has written works of striking originality and imagination. In The Blind Assassin, she stretches the limits of her accomplishments as never before, creating a novel that is entertaining and profoundly serious.

The novel opens with these simple, resonant words: "Ten days after the war ended, my sister drove a car off the bridge." They are spoken by Iris, whose terse account of her sister Laura's death in 1945 is followed by an inquest report proclaiming the death accidental. But just as the listener expects to settle into Laura's story, Atwood introduces a novel-within-a- novel. Entitled The Blind Assassin, it is a science fiction story told by two unnamed lovers who meet in dingy backstreet rooms. When we return to Iris, it is through a 1947 newspaper article announcing the discovery of a sailboat carrying the dead body of her husband, a distinguished industrialist.

Told in a style that magnificently captures the colloquialisms and clichés of the 1930s and 1940s, The Blind Assassin is a richly layered and uniquely rewarding experience. The novel has many threads and a series of events that follow one another at a breathtaking pace. As everything comes together, listeners will discover that the story Atwood is telling is not only what it seems to be—but, in fact, much more.

The Blind Assassin proves once again that Atwood is one of the most talented, daring, and exciting writers of our time. Like The Handmaid's Tale, it is destined to become a classic.

©2000 by O.W. Toad, Ltd.

Critic reviews

Book Sense Book of the Year Award Finalist, Adult Fiction, 2001

"Dionne’s narration is hypnotic and moody, mapping out Atwood’s social and emotional geography, the many little hurts and betrayals, and the hopes. Listeners will find themselves piecing together the clues, guessing at truths, but the rewards are to be found in the layering of details and the skill of the storytelling." –AudioFile

“An example of a writer at the very peak of her performance.…As it delves into the kinds of relationships that can exist between men and women and the rich and poor, it becomes a compassionate and utterly honest book. It is profound and touching. It is to be treasured.”
–Edmonton Journal

“The Blind Assassin is the kind of story so full of intrigue and desperation that you take it to bed with you simply because you can’t bear to put it down.…It’s one thing to write an accomplished novel; it’s another entirely to spin a tale so brilliantly that the reader internalizes it.” –Harper’s Bazaar

“Margaret Atwood is one of the greatest writers alive.…A novel of luminous prose, scalpel-precise insights and fierce characters.…[The Blind Assassin] is so assured, so elegant and so incandescently intelligent, she casts her contemporaries in the shade.” –Atlanta Journal-Constitution

I love Atwood, generally speaking but...

This one was a genuine struggle for me. Sometimes complexity and multi-layered tales become burdensome and this story was that for me. I usually really love tales by this author but this is one I had to call it quits on.

Excellent!

This was my first ever experience with an audiobook and now I'm hooked. The story was great, and the narrator seems just right for the story.

Really wonderful

Margaret Atwood is my favorite author, and this is one of her best. It's intense and intelligent and sweet and heart breaking.

Takes you all over the place. Not expected

Takes you all over the place. You may feel like it's a little slow, but if you put yourself in the place of an old woman telling her story. and just let it evolve, it is very good.

Perfect actress for this story!

Margot Dionne is perfect for the part of Iris Chase. Bravo Audible. A definite must listen.

What a complex book!

I found this book to be complex (in a good way), with beautiful language. At first I was so engrossed by the different plots interwoven together that I didn't notice that overall the book is about a family tragedy. Wondering "which one is it!?" kept me going for a long time.

An excellent book

While yes, everyone is correct, the audio quality of the book is quite poor, this is an exceptional story that is worth your time. A very good read.

Fascinating novel, brilliantly performed

This novel won the Booker Prize, and I can understand why. It has a very compelling narrative arc--it actually juggles three plot lines simultaneously--and Atwood's command of language is dazzling. Her turns of phrase, metaphors, and descriptions catch you off guard with their out-of-kilter clarity. (This is a book you want to quote.) She is able to paint characters of great complexity, to talk about sexual intimacy with frankness, to engage the reader as both storyteller and social historian. I was drawn in from the very beginning and had that delicious "book sadness" when it was over. Given that there is a story within the story, and another story within the subsidiary story, it might have been a less than ideal candidate for audio presentation. But Margot Dionne is one of the finest readers I have encountered yet, on a par with Prunella Scales and Simon Vance. Utterly fluent with the prose, she is able to give each character an immediately recognizable voice--cadence, timbre, accent. She made this multi-faceted book clear at every point. I have read some complaints about the recorded sound. No, it was not done in a quiet digital studio, but I had no issues with the continuity, the occasional background noises (birds chirping quietly at one point), the bit of hiss in the playback. If anything, it suited the material perfectly. This beautiful novel is in the best possible hands. Highly recommended.

Poor sound quality

The story is interesting and the narrator does a good job telling this Canadian story in an authentic way. Unfortunately the recording has a tinny quality that gave me a headache when using headphones. Without headphones the audio still sounded wrong. I have never encountered this type of sound from Audible before.

Beautifully told story

This novel is a departure from Margaret Atwood's "Oryx and Crake" series. It's set in Canada in the nineteen-teens through the depression and again later in the 1980's. The rise and fall of a Canadian merchant family and their tragedies and triumphs flow beautifully through the seemingly powerless narrator. Atwood manages to get a beautiful and dark sci-fi story in as told between two lovers meeting. Both stories are compelling and heartbreaking. It's a thoroughly enjoyable read.