In that pursuit she joins Becka, whose father-Doctor Grove, a prominent dentist-has been sexually abusing her and his other underage female patients for years. Learning that she is the daughter of a Handmaid, Agnes manages to escape her arranged marriage by becoming a Supplicant, a prospective Aunt. Agnes is arranged to be married to Commander Judd, now a high-ranking official in charge of the Eyes and surveilling the population of Gilead. Desiring a child for herself, she acquires a Handmaid, who successfully conceives but later dies giving birth to a son. Once widowed, Commander Kyle marries Paula, the widow of a deceased Commander, who despises Agnes. Agnes and her classmates Becka and Shunammite attend an elite preparatory school for the daughters of Commanders, where they are taught to run a household, but not to become literate. Agnes has a loving relationship with Tabitha, who later dies of ill health. In secret, Aunt Lydia despises Gilead and becomes a mole supplying critical information to the Mayday resistance organization.įifteen years after the events of The Handmaid's Tale, a girl named Agnes Jemima is growing up in Boston as the adopted daughter of Commander Kyle and his wife Tabitha. The Aunts use Ardua Hall as their headquarters and enjoy certain privileges that include reading 'forbidden' texts, such as Cardinal John Henry Newman's Apologia Pro Vita Sua. After enduring weeks of squalid conditions, torture, and solitary confinement, she and a small group of other women are handpicked by Commander Judd and Vidala, a pre-existing supporter of Gilead, to become Aunts-an elite group of women tasked with creating and overseeing the laws and uniforms governing Gilead's women. Lydia, a divorced judge, is imprisoned with other women in a stadium during the establishment of Gilead. The novel alternates among the perspectives of three women, presented as portions of a manuscript written by one (the Ardua Hall Holograph) and testimonies by the other two. Actress Ann Dowd will reprise her role as Aunt Lydia. Streaming service Hulu, which also produces the Handmaid's Tale series, announced in 2022 that The Testaments will also become a series after the Handmaid's Tale 's final season concludes. It was also voted 'Best Fiction' novel in the Goodreads Choice Awards 2019, winning by over 50,000 votes. The Testaments was a joint winner of the 2019 Booker Prize, alongside Bernardine Evaristo's novel Girl, Woman, Other. It is narrated by Aunt Lydia, a character from the previous novel Agnes, a young woman living in Gilead and Daisy, a young woman living in Canada. The novel is set 15 years after the events of The Handmaid's Tale. It is the sequel to The Handmaid's Tale (1985). The Testaments is a 2019 novel by Margaret Atwood.

Handmaid's tale the book