The Heart Goes Last - by Margaret Atwood (Paperback)

About the Book

"Margaret Atwood puts the human heart to the ultimate test in an utterly brilliant new novel that is as visionary as The Handmaid's Tale and as richly imagined as The Blind Assassin. Stan and Charmaine are a married couple trying to stay afloat in the midst of an economic and social collapse. Job loss has forced them to live in their car, leaving them vulnerable to roving gangs. They desperately need to turn their situation around and fast. The Positron Project in the town of Consilience seems to be the answer to their prayers. No one is unemployed and everyone gets a comfortable, clean house to live in for six months out of the year. On alternating months, residents of Consilience must leave their homes and function as inmates in the Positron prison system. Once their month of service in the prison is completed, they can return to their "civilian" homes. At first, this doesn't seem like too much of a sacrifice to make in order to have a roof over one's head and food to eat. But when Charmaine becomes romantically involved with the man who lives in their house during the months when she and Stan are in the prison, a series of troubling events unfolds, putting Stan's life in danger. With each passing day, Positron looks less like a prayer answered and more like a chilling prophecy fulfilled"--

Book Synopsis

From the bestselling author of The Handmaid's Tale and The Testaments--in the gated community of Consilience, residents who sign a contract will get a job and a lovely house for six months of the year...if they serve as inmates in the Positron prison system for the alternate months.

"Captivating...thrilling." --The New York Times Book Review

Stan and Charmaine, a young urban couple, have been hit by job loss and bankruptcy in the midst of nationwide economic collapse. Forced to live in their third-hand Honda, where they are vulnerable to roving gangs, they think the gated community of Consilience may be the answer to their prayers. At first, this seems worth it: they will have a roof over their heads and food on the table. But when a series of troubling events unfolds, Positron begins to look less like a prayer answered and more like a chilling prophecy fulfilled.

The Heart Goes Last is a vivid, urgent vision of development and decay, freedom and surveillance, struggle and hope--and the timeless workings of the human heart.

Review Quotes

"Captivating. . . . Thrilling. . . . Margaret Atwood [is] a living legend." --The New York Times Book Review

"Quintessential Atwood. . . . The writing here is so persuasive, so crisp, that it seeps under your skin." --The Boston Globe

"An arresting perspective on the confluence of information, freedom, and security in the modern age." --The New Yorker

"A gripping, psychologically acute portrayal of our own future gone totally wrong, and the eternal constant of flawed humanity." --Huffington Post

"Dystopia virtuoso Margaret Atwood turns her effortless world-building, deft humor and grim commentary on the depths of human hubris to the prison industrial complex, love and free will." --The Denver Post

"Rare apocalyptic entertainment. . . . Not only does Atwood sketch out an all-too-possible future but she also looks to the past, tapping into archetypes from fairy tales and myth, giving the novel a resonance beyond satire." --The Miami Herald

"Another Atwood classic." --St. Louis Post-Dispatch

"Poignant. . . . Gloriously madcap. . . . You only pause in your laughter when you realise that, in its constituent parts, the world she depicts here is all too horribly plausible." --The Guardian (London)

"Engrossing." --The Austin Chronicle

"Wonderful. . . . Explores the idea of a powerful system and its discontents. . . . Atwood's The Heart Goes Last is a riveting addition to her oeuvre." --Electric Literature

"Atwood's creepy but entertaining vision of a possible future." --The Washington Times

"Fast-paced and funny. . . . True love ultimately endures in The Heart Goes Last, but so do the real terrors present in Atwood novels, all too often manifesting in ours." --PopMatters

"Eerily prophetic. . . . A heady blend of speculative fiction with noir undertones that is provocative, powerful and will prompt all readers to reassess which parts of their humanity are for sale." --BookPage

"Ever-inventive, astutely observant, and drolly ironic, Atwood unfurls a riotous plot. . . . This laser-sharp, hilariously campy, and swiftly flowing satire delves deeply into our desires, vices, biases, and contradictions, bringing fresh, incisive comedy to the rising tide of postapocalyptic fiction . . . in which Atwood has long been a clarion voice." --Booklist (starred review)

About the Author

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, was followed in 2019 by a sequel, The Testaments, which was a global number one bestseller and won the Booker Prize. In 2020 she published Dearly, her first collection of poetry for a decade.

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, the PEN USA Lifetime Achievement Award and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. 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.