false 78433 34 <I>The Blind Assassin</I> is a tale of two sisters, one of whom dies under ambiguous circumstances in the opening pages. The survivor, Iris Chase Griffen, initially seems a little cold-blooded about this death in the family. But as Margaret Atwood's most ambitious work unfolds--a tricky process, in fact, with several nested narratives and even an entire novel-within-a-novel--we're reminded of just how complicated the familial game of hide-and-seek can be: <i>What had she been thinking of as the car sailed off the bridge, then hung suspended in the afternoon sunlight, glinting like a dragonfly, for that one instant of held breath before the plummet? Of Alex, of Richard, of bad faith, of our father and his wreckage; of God, perhaps, and her fatal, triangular bargain. </i> Meanwhile, Atwood immediately launches into an excerpt from Laura Chase's novel, <I>The Blind Assassin</I>, posthumously published in 1947. In this double-decker concoction, a wealthy woman dabbles in blue-collar passion, even as her lover regales her with a series of science-fictional parables. Complicated? You bet. But the author puts all this variegation to good use, taking expert measure of our capacity for self-delusion and complicity, not to mention desolation. Almost everybody in her sprawling narrative manages to--or prefers to--overlook what's in plain sight. And memory isn't much of a salve either, as Iris points out: "Nothing is more difficult than to understand the dead, I've found; but nothing is more dangerous than to ignore them." Yet Atwood never succumbs to postmodern cynicism, or modish contempt for her characters. On the contrary, she's capable of great tenderness, and as we immerse ourselves in Iris's spliced-in memoir, it's clear that this buttoned-up socialite has been anything but blind to the chaos surrounding her. <I>--Darya Silver</I> 3246409 book 2000 The Blind Assassin total:14007|5:4053|4:5381|3:3333|2:947|1:293| 14007 53975 19288 1384 4 12 false false Tue Apr 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Wed Apr 16 09:52:52 -0700 2008 Thu Apr 17 06:53:58 -0700 2008 more...]]> 5 8 false false Sun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Jun 28 13:57:18 -0700 2007 Sun Jul 15 09:23:09 -0700 2007 Blind Assassin started out fairly slowly for me. I'd picked it up at the same time as Time Traveler's Wife and TTW won out for which book hooked me faster. Part of the slowness is due to the narrative devices used to tell the story. Some of the story is told from a first-person viewpoint with the n...more...]]> 5 5 false false Thu Jun 19 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Tue Jun 03 14:21:24 -0700 2008 Thu Jun 19 10:57:50 -0700 2008 The Blind Assassin, it's obvious that Atwood had fun crafting the complicated storyline, which is just as enjoyable for the reader as it must have been for the writer. The interplay of past, present, and fiction-within-fiction all merge in the end to provide a complete picture of the life of...more...]]> 5 6 false false Fri Sep 26 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Tue May 06 16:37:52 -0700 2008 Fri Sep 26 21:15:49 -0700 2008 1 The Blind Assassin is too gorgeous to merely admire. I love it. Where it isn't exquisite, it's precise. It moves expertly between the dry, the brutally truthful, and the passionate, and brings the keenness of the author's eye to them all. Atw...more...]]> 5 5 false false Sun Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2006 Mon Apr 23 11:27:40 -0700 2007 Thu May 08 21:53:07 -0700 2008
Atwood can be criticized as being somewhat cold and distant in her narrative style. That's certainly valid and definitely turns off some people.

But for my money The Blind Assassin is one of the most perfect novels I've ever rea...more...]]> 2 6 false false Fri Feb 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Tue Jan 29 20:29:12 -0800 2008 Sun Feb 24 16:16:13 -0800 2008
Verdict? It was... okay. The writing was really great, but everything else kind of bored me -- the characters, the plot, the novel within the novel within the novel. B...more...]]> 4 8 false false Sun Aug 23 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Sat Feb 21 18:39:19 -0800 2009 Sun Aug 23 17:38:37 -0700 2009 To any happy Flower
The Frost beheads it at its play --
In accidental power --
The blonde Assassin passes on --
The Sun proceeds unmoved
To measure off another Day
For an Approving God.
-Emily Dickinson

In the novel-withi...more...]]> 5 3 false false Wed Aug 20 00:33:22 -0700 2008 Wed Aug 20 00:33:31 -0700 2008 more...]]> 2 3 false false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Fri Sep 21 00:30:03 -0700 2007 Wed Oct 10 11:42:58 -0700 2007 more...]]> 1 6 false false Sun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sun Jun 17 00:31:37 -0700 2007 Fri Aug 10 17:11:02 -0700 2007
There is the story of two sisters growing...more...]]> 4 2 false false Sat Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Sep 10 09:46:34 -0700 2007 Thu Sep 20 12:21:14 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 2 false false Tue Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sun Sep 02 23:40:32 -0700 2007 Fri Jul 04 12:04:08 -0700 2008
Iris Chase Winifred is approaching the end of her l...more...]]> 5 2 false false Thu Apr 01 00:00:00 -0800 2004 Fri Aug 10 16:01:05 -0700 2007 Thu May 08 21:53:07 -0700 2008 2 more...]]> 2 2 false false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sun Jun 10 18:17:07 -0700 2007 Fri Oct 05 17:29:08 -0700 2007
I was bored by all...more...]]> 3 2 false false Tue May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sat May 26 11:59:02 -0700 2007 Mon Jun 11 17:25:48 -0700 2007 more...]]> 4 1 false false Mon Dec 29 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Fri Jan 16 10:30:07 -0800 2009 Fri Jan 16 10:44:19 -0800 2009
I find the way she tells the story brilliant and consuming. I love the way the pieces start to all fit together as your read more and how I becom...more...]]> 2 1 false false Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Dec 23 11:36:21 -0800 2008 Thu Jan 15 19:29:50 -0800 2009 more...]]> 5 1 false false Thu Dec 04 11:44:21 -0800 2008 Thu Dec 04 11:44:54 -0800 2008
Margaret Atwood's first novel, The Edible Woman, was published in 1969. I just finished her 38th book, The Blind Assassin, which won the 2000 Booker Prize for Fiction and the International Association of Crime Writers Dashiell Hammett Award. This woman ca...more...]]> 3 1 false false Tue Sep 23 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Mon Sep 08 15:08:15 -0700 2008 Wed Sep 24 10:48:38 -0700 2008 or can you?) But sometimes it's more convenient to define something by what it’s NOT, rather than what it is. For instance, “The Golden Compass” ISN’T just for kids. “Animal Farm” ISN’T about zoology. The stupid book floating arou...more...]]> 4 1 false false Sat Aug 02 17:18:56 -0700 2008 Sat Aug 02 17:34:10 -0700 2008 more...]]>