Old Babes in the Wood

A dazzling collection of short stories from the internationally acclaimed, award-winning author of The Handmaid's Tale and The Testaments, these stories delve deeply into the heart of family relationships, marriage, loss, and memory, exploring what it means to spend a life together. Margaret Atwood has established herself as one of the most visionary and canonical authors in the world. This collection of fifteen extraordinary stories, some of which have appeared in The New Yorker and The New York Times Magazine, explores the full spectrum of experience, speaking to our unique times with Atwood's characteristic insight, wit, and intellect.

The two intrepid sisters of the title story grapple with loss and memory on a perfect summer evening; "Impatient Griselda" explores alienation and miscommunication with a fresh twist on a folkloric classic; and "My Evil Mother" touches on the fantastical, examining a mother-daughter relationship in which the mother purports to be a witch. At the heart of the collection are seven extraordinary stories that follow a married couple across the decades, capturing the moments big and small that make up a long life of uncommon love—and what comes after. Returning to short fiction for the first time since her 2014 collection Stone Mattress, Atwood showcases both her creativity and her humanity in these remarkable tales, which by turns delight, illuminate, and quietly devastate.