The Handmaid's Tale Graphic Novels & Stories

Hera tightened the twining of her three first fingers and moved the two kissing fingers closed to each other, making it look like the banana bell, and then, with her heart beating fast, she pulled them apart and made the forefinger and thumb kissed each other, facing them upwards. Afraid she might have screwed it up, she looked up and ended up swearing when the rubber-like hands disappeared. Staring left and right in the hope to find for that shit of a hand lurking somewhere, she saw only the grotesque images painted on the walls enclosing them in. “Did it work?”

Other works included metal sculptures, canvases covered in glass and beads and ribbons, and more traditional paintings of people that were haunting in their colors and overall composition. Thea hadn’t entered in paintings, and now she wished she had. She hadn’t entered at all, actually. After she’d sent out a number of query letters to agents for her graphic novel, she hadn’t heard anything for weeks. Assuming rejection, she’d been about to send out a second round of letters to other agents when she’d gotten the email from an agent in New York.

I could have easily mistaken this for sleep, but the purple lips and the pale skin don’t lie. Queen Zuri is dead. And I can hear the soft cries of a baby. I rush forward while Alistair remains frozen by the door and Jossie covering her mouth like she’s going to throw up. As the handmaidens attend to the Queen, Gynith faces me. In her arms in a bundle of cloth, from which a small pink hand reaches out. I approach more slowly after seeing the hand, my chest a swirl of emotions.

She looked at the sheet a young woman was working on. It showed a tree, not one of the identical plantation trees, but a massive, gnarled oak, its branches spread wide. As Liora watched, the weaver etched a child’s swing hanging from one of the branches, and then the figure of a man pushing the swing. The image was simple, but it radiated a profound sense of peace and joy. “This is how we fight,” a soft voice said beside her. It was the weaver. She had kind, tired eyes. “The grey cannot take what is written in metal. They can melt it, but they cannot un-remember it. We save the stories they try to erase.”

The words crawled across the wall like vermin. “Then we show them,” Sophia said. “We don’t argue. We show. Hand to hand, voice to ear.” Amina nodded, though the tightness around her jaw betrayed fear. “You realize this might be our only circle for weeks. If we fail here…” “We won’t fail,” Sophia replied, gripping the cloth fragments in her palm. The fabric was small but dense with meaning, embroidered with threads Raven and Elise had coded into analog glyphs before severing the lattice. Each one contained a story, a pulse of memory, that no algorithm could replicate.

“But I don’t underestimate its memory.” She lifted her right hand and called up her seal—not with force, but with presence. The glyph shimmered softly, alive with layered meaning. It wasn’t just a mark; it was a story. Her story. The compromise. The battles. The bond with Dain. The surrender of power without losing self. It wasn’t perfect. That was what made it true. Elias reached into his sleeve and drew out a single, rotating glyph—sleek, seamless, and cold. He released it into the lattice, and the false structure surged, as if fed by certainty.

My breasts tingle, my hands sizzle with the need to reach out and touch him. I don't know what he reads on my face but his eyes have gone cold again and his voice is even more intimidating. "Put down the cloth." I'm no good at following orders, never have been, especially those given by men. I have no idea why the cloth slips from my fingers and lands in the bowl. Dagger leans in and picks it up. His chest is inches from my eyes and his tats fill my vision. The ink appears prison-grade, but the artwork is intricate. A Grim Reaper stands over a crying woman holding a swaddled baby. The design weaves into swirls of flowers with branches that turn to thorns as they flow further out across his c

I whispered to myself. But my hands had already moved. Inside the package was a single sheet of paper, folded once. No note. No explanation. Just a drawing. My breath left me in a sharp, broken exhale. It was done in crayon. Bold lines. Messy edges. A child’s certainty in every stroke. A woman stood at the center of the page, her arms raised. Blue and yellow zigzags burst from her hands, stretching outward like lightning. Behind her stood two children. One taller. One smaller. Both drawn close to her back, like they were hiding and standing tall at the same time.

Theresa alone had been altered. The pain caught up with me again as I glided over the stairs. I coughed, clutching my bloody belly, and stumbled to the ground, my blood spilling onto the floor. I had to get up, had to keep moving, but it was so painful . . . Then I noticed movements in Salem’s murals. The figures portrayed were distorting, bulging, until they pushed out from the walls and ceiling, becoming flesh and form. Claws and maws grew from every wall. The maids tore open as Uncivil ripped out from the paintings behind them. Their blood splattered against the walls, becoming part of the vast paintings.

The world narrowed to the harsh, penciled lines on the parchment. Althea’s own face, rendered in startling intimacy, looked up at her from the filth. Her hand, captured in the act of reaching for Kaelan’s cheek, seemed to tremble on the page. The artist’s skill was a violation, turning sacred secrets into vulgar fact. Kaelan’s hand closed over hers, not on the sketch, but on her cold fingers. “Don’t look,” he said, his voice ragged. “We need to burn them. All of them.”