Moral Disorder: And Other Stories

Atwood, Margaret Eleanor

3.64

12,008 ratings by Goodreads

9780739340516: Moral Disorder: And Other Stories

ISBN 10: 0739340514 ISBN 13: 9780739340516

Publisher: Random House, 2006

Atwood triumphs with these dazzling, personal stories in her first collection since Wilderness Tips.

In these ten interrelated stories Atwood traces the course of a life and also the lives intertwined with it, while evoking the drama and the humour that colour common experiences — the birth of a baby, divorce and remarriage, old age and death. With settings ranging from Toronto, northern Quebec, and rural Ontario, the stories begin in the present, as a couple no longer young situate themselves in a larger world no longer safe. Then the narrative goes back in time to the forties and moves chronologically forward toward the present.

In “The Art of Cooking and Serving,” the twelve-year-old narrator does her best to accommodate the arrival of a baby sister. After she boldly declares her independence, we follow the narrator into young adulthood and then through a complex relationship. In “The Entities,” the story of two women haunted by the past unfolds. The magnificent last two stories reveal the heartbreaking old age of parents but circle back again to childhood, to complete the cycle.

By turns funny, lyrical, incisive, tragic, earthy, shocking, and deeply personal, Moral Disorder displays Atwood’s celebrated storytelling gifts and unmistakable style to their best advantage. This is vintage Atwood, writing at the height of her powers.
From the Hardcover edition.

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Review:

A model of distillation, precision, clarity and detail . . . Atwood writes with compassion and intensity not only about her characters but also about the 20th century itself (INDEPENDENT)

Ingenious and perceptive. . . deserves to become a quiet classic (SPECTATOR)

An emotional journey through loneliness, love, loss and old age. . . This snapshot collection is a study of memory, to be cherished (THE TIMES)

Vivid, crispy focused, full of depth and beguiling detail (SUNDAY TIMES MAGAZINE)

Book Description:

* A superb collection of short stories from one of our best-loved writers - now reissued with a striking new jacket along with other newly jacketed titles from Margaret Atwood's backlist

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