Bluebeard's Egg: Stories (Paperback)

~ (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

"Conversations in our family were not about feelings," recalls the teenage narrator of "Hurricane Hazel"about her breakup with a boyfriend who "meant what is usually called absolutely nothing to me"in Atwood's (The Handmaid's Tale, etc.) second collection of shortfiction. Unfortunately, the author's arch cleverness and cool understatementanesthetize the impact of the stories' conversations and gloomy relationshipsbetween parents and children, husbands and wives, friends and lovers. Symbols abound and some, reminiscent of Atwood's "edible woman" cake in the book of the same title, are strained. In "Uglypuss," the discordant lovers are political activists; at one point they plan to picket a sock company and dramatize the crucifixion, portraying Christ as a large knitted sock, in red and white stripes. But the collection is somewhat redeemed by the affecting title story, where an egga deceptively innocuous object that, according to the legend, ultimately marks as disobedient two of Bluebeard's unfortunate wivesaptly symbolizes the protagonist's premonitions of doom about her marriage to a man she is desperately afraid of losing, although she describes him as obtuse, blundering and predictable.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

This excellent book of short stories by one of Canada's best-known authors glitters with vivid characterizations and examples of finely crafted story telling. Atwood's dramatic range is impressive. She opens with humorous, gently satirical stories about childhood and adolescence. Her title story skillfully portrays a woman's fear and grief as she begins to question her husband's faithfulness and her own perceptions, while other stories show the despair of characters who are trying to salvage lost relationships or to establish new ones. Many of these stories have the pacing and tone of spoken tales, stories told on front porches or repeated between mothers and daughters. This entertaining book by a gifted writer is highly recommended. Lucinda Ann Peck, Learning Design Assocs . , Gahanna, Ohio
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Anchor (January 20, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385491042
• ISBN-13: 978-0385491044
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #830,053 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in this category: (What's this?)

  #77 in

  Books > Literature & Fiction > Authors, A-Z > ( A ) > Atwood, Margaret

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars facets of our world, September 17, 1999

By A Customer

This was the first book by Margaret Atwood I read after reading the short story "Happy Ending" in an anthology.

A great writer is easily recognisable. All you have to do is to write a few lines of a novel or a short story. You will just keep on reading and feel sorry when you are closer to the end than to the beginning of the story.

This collection of short stories shows that Margaret Atwood is a major writer and story teller. Of course, not in the pulp fiction or slimy-sweet sense but you need a curiosity for the inner world of soliloquies and self-observations.

However, she does not give us lectures on psychology, but tells us the story and we can live it from the inside.

In three of the stories the seeds of her later novel, "Cat's Eye" can be found, which I was inspired to read exactly by them. Short stories can always be a good introduction or lead-in for writer and reader alike.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Tactile and tangible with biting wit, April 5, 1998

By A Customer

In Bluebeard's Egg, Margaret Atwood weaves her poetic prose though twelve short stories that are as haunting as they are hilarious. Atwood takes the reader on a journey within her characters' minds, using real life for the canvass of her work. While the reader senses almost no movement through the physical world, there is a striking depth and distance traveled in each story.

Atwood's characters range from neurotic artists to doctor's wives, all linked by their dysfunctional existence. In "Uglypuss," Joel, a struggling theater director, goes out for a drink when his estranged girlfriend announces that she is coming over. After a rendezvous of casual sex with an old aquaintance, Joel returns to find his place ravaged and his cat missing. It is in this twisted context where the protagonist asks, "what's the point of continuing, in a society like this one, where it's always two steps forward and two back?"

Atwood, like only a handful of other authors, is able to sharply focus her writing while grappling with philosophical issues. Yvonne, in "The Sunrise," wonders: "if art sucks and everything is only art, what has she done with her life?" All the while, the reader is grounded in sensory details, like Kimberly's "wet pink oyster-like mouth."

In many of the stories, Atwood melts past with present, mimicking the random texture of human thought. The seamless prose carries the reader along, stopping at childhood beach cabins, home economics class, and erotic sexual encounters. These retrospective glimpses are preludes to the hauntingly familiar world that the characters inhabit.

With Bluebeard's Egg, Atwood has reached a new plateau in her writing, showcasing complete mastery of the craft. Her prose grabs the reader, poking and prodding until the comical and horrific are somehow inseperable. This is superlative serious fiction from one of the most prolific authors of the genre. END

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Captivated by the Egg., June 2, 2002

By	Britt Arnhild Lindland (Norway) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Bluebeard's Egg (Audio Cassette)

In the car I always have an audiobook to listen to, and the last weeks I really have enjoyed Margareth Atwood's Bluebeard's Egg and other stories.

This is a collection of short stories written by a master of words, and a master of short stories. When Atwood writes she uses no extra words or sentences, she takes us right to the point, and the point in this collection is human beings. Common human beings fighting for their lives. No heros, just plain people like you and me. Every time a new story starts I think, this one cannot be better than the last, but it happend again and again, the story captivates me, and it is all mornings hard to stop the car and go to work - I want to hear just one more sentence, and then one more.

My favorite story though is the one that has given name to the collection, Bluebeard's Egg. A well known fairy tale, told and given it's own meaning by Atwood, or may be she just shows us the original meaning of the story. Sally, the main carachter of the story struggles with the puzzle of her life, to keep all the pieces together. The center of her life is her husband Ed, but how can she be sure that she is also the center in Ed's life? No one can write about this, invite us into and let us be in the feeling of the story like Atwood do.

Britt Arnhild Lindland