BY THE BESTSELLING, PRIZE-WINNING AUTHOR OF THE HANDMAID'S TALE

'Clara', she said, 'do you think I'm normal?'
'I'd say you're almost abnormally normal, if you know what I mean.'

Marian is determinedly ordinary, waiting to get married. She likes her work, her broody flatmate and her sober fiancé Peter. All goes well at first, but Marian has reckoned without an inner self that wants something more, that calmly sabotages her careful plans, her stable routine - and her digestion. Marriage à la mode, Marian discovers, is something she literally can't stomach . . .

Margaret Atwood's first novel is both a scathingly funny satire of consumerism and a heady exploration of emotional cannibalism.

'Written with a brilliant angry energy' OBSERVER

'Atwood has the magic of turning the particular and the parochial into the universal' THE TIMES

'Margaret Atwood not only has a sense of humour, she has wit and style in abundance . . . a joy to read' GOOD HOUSEKEEPING