Loneliness, loss, and a sense of incredulity and amazement: that’s what getting old really feels like. For those who are far from those aging milestones, Margaret Atwood’s latest short story collection may seem almost like an anthropological study. But for those of us who are rapidly reaching (or have already reached) our Medicare years, these stories ring with a poignant and authentic truth.

Margaret Atwood is 83. Her husband and life partner, the writer Graeme Gibson, died a few years back. Ms. Atwood believes she was descended from a woman lynched for supposedly being a witch. It’s important to keep all this in mind while delving into these stories, which, at their heart, are at least a little bit autobiographical.

About half the stories revolve around an aging married couple named Nell and Tig. Particularly worthy for me is the one entitled Widows, where Ms. Atwood writes that, “Time has ceased to be linear, with life events and memories in a chronological row like beads on a string. It’s the strangest feeling or experience, or rearrangement. I’m not sure I can explain it to you.” Some of the Nell and Tig stories lose their emotional attachment through the details of everyday life; others shine.

Others that are sandwiched in provide a bit of comic relief mixed with irony and headshaking. Chief among these is Airborne, where professional women gather together to work on creating a panel. During their time together, they reminisce about the devolvement of language, joke about passwords and political correctness and feminism, and ruefully consider the changes that have taken place. Another good one is Metempsychosis, about a snail who is reincarnated within the body of a female bank teller. The Dead Interview, a dialogue between Ms. Atwood and George Orwell (one of her influences), is illuminating and well-crafted.

Although this is not the strongest of Margaret Atwood’s short story collections, it is perhaps her most personal, and as such, a must-read. I am grateful to Doubleday and NetGalley for enabling me to be an early reader in exchange for an honest review.

This was my very first Margaret Atwood novel, and it definitely will not be my last! I highly recommend it.

A collection of short stories ranging from an alien telling fairytales, to an evil mother who tell her daughter her father became a garden gnome after he left, to a married couple experiencing the day to day dulls. The themes explore everything from aging, romantic and platonic relationships, family dynamics and societal expectations.

Having only known Margaret Atwood from Handmaids Tale and Alias Grace, it is refreshing story telling in snippets.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This collection for me was a bit disappointing. I love Atwood's writing but personally found this lacking. I enjoyed a few of the stories, my favorite being freeforall. I enjoyed that concept and love distoptic settings. Mostly I just found myself bored and not wanting to pick this up. It makes me sad because I always go into reading with an open mind but just struggled with this. I know every book or collection isn't for everyone and this one just didn't hit the mark for me.
#netgalley

I am a huge fan of Margaret Atwood, so I was thrilled to have the opportunity to read this advance copy from the publisher.

In this collection of new and old stories, she continues with her themes of futurism juxtaposed with traditional/retro societal expectations, family dynamics, always weaving in a bit of the macabre. One thing that really stood out to me in this collection was the overall focus on relationships between people, both romantic and platonic, and how they deal with aging. Using themes around career, physical and mental health, cancer, and others, she really does a beautiful job at showing the complexities in growing older, and how relationships evolve during this time. She also does a few interesting stories that rely on telling background stories/memoir type of descriptions on some aging characters, showing how different they were in their younger years that I really enjoyed.

I wholeheartedly recommend this book whether you're a big Atwood fan or just looking for some really engaging short stories to enjoy.

I wanted to enjoy this but was overly unimpressed with the relationships, the dynamic, and the plot felt convoluted.

This book of short stories read like little fragments of bigger stories and of all of them I maybe enjoyed 1. Unfortunately this just didn’t work for me and I was bored and forcing myself to keep reading

These stories seem to be very personal for Atwood, and certainly many of them seem to be thinly-disguised aspects of her own life, but they're quite different from her earlier stories. They're a little bitter, a little resigned, a little cruel than her writing usually is. These don't have the same spark and wit her earlier work does. I do understand how writers' voices and approaches change over time, and Atwood has definitely undergone change in her writing over the last 10-12 years. I can't say I like it as much.

It's always a pleasure to read something new by Margaret Atwood, and this collection does not disappoint. This is my first read of short stories by Margaret Atwood, but I've enjoyed several of her other books immensely. One of my favorites, 'My Evil Mother' has been published as a separate story by Amazon. This collection of 15 short stories has some great stories, and some slow drawn out stories that I felt were too long and cumbersome.
My favorite stories are 'My Evil Mother', where a daughter suspects her mother may be a witch; 'FreeforAll', the story of an alien transporting and entertaining his human captives; 'Metempsychosis', the story of a snail trapped in the body of a female bank teller (hilarious); and 'The Dead Interview', Atwood's interview with George Orwell. Several of these could make an entire book on their own. The remaining stories revolve around an aging married couple, Tig and Nell. These stories are heartfelt and describe their day to day life together. One is a tale of Tig uncovering her father in laws war diaries and papers, this goes on for quite awhile describing his entire experience and life before and after WWII. That one was interesting but a bit too long. What's nice about a short story collection is if you don't like one, just start the next one! It's great to see Ms Atwood back in grand form and I look forward to more fiction from her!

I love short stories, and of course when written by Atwood, they’re a treat. A great collection filled with dark humor.

Old Babes in the Woods is Atwood's first collection of short stories since 2014 so I was thrilled to delve into this. The stories range from strange and wonderful to disturbing and heartbreaking. Highly recommended. Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC>

I usually wouldn't choose a book of short stories to read. The exception this time was simply the author. What a treat some of these stories are! I have to admit I didn't care for all of them. I did mourn Smudgie though. Thanks to author Margaret Atwood, Doubleday Books, and NetGalley. I received a complimentary copy of this ebook. The opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own.