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Book of Lives
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  • Published: 4 November 2025
  • ISBN: 9781529936087
  • Imprint: Vintage Digital
  • Format: Audio Download
  • RRP: $75.00
Categories:

Book of Lives

A Memoir of Sorts

Formats & editions
Hardback
4 Nov 2025
EBook
4 Nov 2025
Audiobook
4 Nov 2025
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The life and times of one of the most important writers of our time, from her peripatetic childhood in the Canadian far north, through the writing of The Handmaid's Tale, to her position today as revered truth-teller and literary icon

How does the greatest writer of our time tell her own story? Immerse yourself in the creative universe of Margaret Atwood for a riot of life, art and everything in between

Every writer is at least two beings: the one who lives, and the one who writes

Raised by scientifically minded parents, Atwood spent most of each year in the wild forest of northern Quebec: a vast playground for her entomologist father and independent, resourceful mother. It was an unfettered and nomadic childhood, sometimes isolated but also thrilling and beautiful.

From this unconventional start, Atwood unfolds the story of her life, linking key moments to the books that have shaped our literary landscape, from the cruel school year that would become Cat’s Eye to the unease of 1980s Berlin, where she began The Handmaid’s Tale. In pages alive with the natural world, reading and books, major political turning points and her lifelong love for the charismatic writer Graeme Gibson, we meet poets, bears, Hollywood stars and larger-than-life characters straight from the pages of an Atwood novel.

As she explores her past, Atwood reveals more and more about her writing, the connections between real life and art – and the workings of one of our boldest imaginations.
  • Published: 4 November 2025
  • ISBN: 9781529936087
  • Imprint: Vintage Digital
  • Format: Audio Download
  • RRP: $75.00
Categories:

About the author

Margaret Atwood

Margaret Atwood is the author of more than fifty books of fiction, poetry and critical essays. Her novels include Cat's Eye, The Robber Bride, Alias Grace, The Blind Assassin and the MaddAddam trilogy. Her 1985 classic, The Handmaid's Tale, went back into the bestseller charts with the election of Donald Trump, when the Handmaids became a symbol of resistance against the disempowerment of women, and with the 2017 release of the award-winning Channel 4 TV series. Its sequel, The Testaments, was published in 2019 and was a global number one bestseller and won the Booker Prize.

Atwood has won numerous awards including the Arthur C. Clarke Award for Imagination in Service to Society, the Franz Kafka Prize, the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade and the PEN USA Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2019 she was made a member of the Order of the Companions of Honour for services to literature. She has also worked as a cartoonist, illustrator, librettist, playwright and puppeteer. She lives in Toronto, Canada.

portrait photo of Margaret Atwood

Also by Margaret Atwood

Freedom
The Handmaid's Tale
Bodily Harm
The Testaments
Dearly
Hag-Seed
Stories
See all

Praise for Book of Lives

Book of Lives, displays the wit, intelligence and complexity that marks her [Atwood’s] best work

Observer

Book of Lives [is] immensely readable… Atwood’s anecdotes and musings are so entertaining, and the fabric of her life, the foundations of her evidently resourceful, hard-working and fiercely funny character so interesting, that this book is never plodding

i

Where most such backward looks are cosily triumphalist or anxiously self-justifying, hers is sharp, funny and engaging... nerdy brainiac, waifish poet, Medusa-eyed feminist, uncanny prophet and one of the great novelists of our time

Blake Morrison, Guardian

Displays the wit, intelligence and complexity that marks her best work... fat and satisfying... these glimpses of the mechanism? are fascinating

Erica Wagner, Observer

Immensely readable... Atwood’s anecdotes and musings are so entertaining, and the fabric of her life, the foundations of her evidently resourceful, hard-working and fiercely funny character so interesting... it never particularly feels like the life of a famous person... The real Margaret Atwood is sentimental, blunt and deliciously naughty

Francesca Steels, iNews

Fiercely funny tales from a literary mafia don... as pacy and fascinating as any of her books... she is hilarious, with a poet's eye for detail and endless short, tart punchlines

India Block, Evening Standard

A remarkable read... successfully puts time in a bottle

LA Times

The scope of Atwood’s fluently written memoir is impressively wide and… is probably best enjoyed slowly, and Atwood...is enjoyable company as she reminisces

Independent

An intimate, beautifully told journey that captures the essence of a remarkable life

Woman & Home

One of the most deliciously engaging memoirs of the decade, this brims over with life, wit and flashes of prophecy

Nilanjana Roy, Financial Times

A book with understated voltage

Martin Chilton, Independent

The Atwood on display here, as incisive as ever…is more emotive, her wit riper and more forgiving, as though she were recounting her life to old friends

Times Literary Supplement

Told with Atwood’s trademark intelligence and wit, Book of Lives is an extraordinary life story, beautifully told

UK Press Syndication

An intimate, beautifully told journey that captures the essence of a remarkable life. Her storytelling mastery makes the audiobook an unforgettable experience

Woman & Home