Gunchoos, you've got to catch Carmen and stop that creep who made the deer disappear.

That fauntering decanter of banter, Vic the Slick.

I'm Greta Johnson.

I'm Tricia Bobita.

And from W. Be Easy in Chicago. This is Nerdette.

Coming up, author Margaret Atwood. It's so helpful to be dead if you're a female artist. Too high a price to pack for me yet. The Queen of the Nerds. That's a designation that I've decided on. I hope that's okay with you, Tricia. You're behind that, right? Mm-hmm. Oh, good. We talk about feminism, science fiction, and the future of the printed page. All that plus your nerd confessions. Right here on Nerdette. For most of you out there in listener land, Margaret Atwood probably needs no introduction. But in case for some reason you've been living under a rock or something and you've never heard of her, you have still probably heard of Handmaid's Tale, which is one of her better known books. The first book that I actually read by her was The Blind Assassin, which I pulled off of my mother's bookshelf and read and adored. And she recently wrote a trilogy that was delightful. It was one of the favorite picks of my ridiculous Alaskan book club session. The first one is called

Orix and Craig. If you haven't read it, you need to just go read it right now. And the third in that

series, Matt Adam, came out earlier this year and is being turned into an HBO show directed by

Darren Aronofsky. Yes, it's all incredible. You will love her. I know I say this about far too many authors, but Margaret

Outwood is definitely one of those people who, it doesn't matter what she writes. I am there 110%.

Many stories are full of revenge and murder. They're dark, but they're not devastatingly depressing.

That's true as well in her most recent book, a collection of stories called Stone

Mattress. So we asked if that characterization could also describe her worldview. Dark but not

devastatingly depressing. Yeah. That's a good description. I'm cheerful by nature. Stifled

laughter. But in fact fact it's true.

But on the other hand, being a Scorpio, we like to know what's underneath the rocks.

So we like to go through the forbidden door, see what's in there.

That need not be devastatingly depressing.

Did that love for looking under the rocks come from literally looking under rocks growing up with your father?

Literally from looking under the rocks.

Because I had an older brother who turned into a biologist, and we spent a lot of time as children

looking under not only rocks where you might find a crayfish, but also under logs where you might find a newt.

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