Atwood writes a dystopia of men's control of women that is often read as a metaphor for life under an Islamic fundamentalist regime or polygamous fundamentalist Christianity. As a story, it's great. As social critique, not so much. 
 The storytelling is gripping and horrifying and it's hard to put down. But it's such a mix of absurdities meant to shock and titillate (like the scene where the man has sex with the fertile "handmaid" while he has joined hands with his wife to symbolize her participation in his priapic triumph) that it comes off as a caricature rather than an effective social critique. Compare Handmaid's Tale to Gabriel Garcia Marquez's "The Autumn of the Patriarch" in which the general (the eponymous patriarch) is a mish-mash of every rumored atrocity of every modern dictator (with a heavy dose of Idi Amin), all spun together in one absurd character. Garcia Marquez gets it right -- it's effective social critique because the character's absurdity is acknowledged by the author himself with a wink and a nudge to the reader. (The scene that most sticks out in my mind: when the general's inflamed and painfully throbbing testicles reach the size of a melon and he has to use a specially designed wheelbarrow to cart them around with him.) Garcia Marquez never takes himself too seriously, though he's one of the most important writers of the twentieth century. Atwood, on the other hand, seems to take herself deadly seriously in this book, and after a while, it just makes you want to roll your eyes. 
 I'm so sick of people calling this book a "really real" portrayal of how society uses cultural norms to oppress women. It's not realistic at all. The fact is, with very few exceptions (possibly the Taliban, though who knows, since it is so demonized and has become such a part of the West's rhetoric justifying military action in Afghanistan that it's probably impossible to get an accurate account of what life under that regime was like for women), oppression of women works only when the cultural rules achieving that oppression are *not* seen as horrifying. They work when they are seen as *reasonable*, as "protecting" women, or as serving a higher social purpose (like "the family"). It is only under such circumstances that women further their own oppression.