I just finished the 3rd and final book, and I have to say, “Wow.”
Such a touching, thought-provoking story.
For anyone not familiar, this is a fantasy series for young adults in three parts:
The Golden Compass
The Subtle Knife
The Amber Spyglass
They are simply terrific. Do yourself a favor. Read them.
Agreed. One of the best fantasy series I’ve read in a long, long time.
It’s occasionally billed as a children’s series, but I would have been terrified of some of the happenings in, especially, the first book as a child.
And I want a daemon!
Julie
I think they’re pretty good. Better than Harry Potter, anyway.
Not to bring down an appreciation thread, but I wouldn’t tell anyone they were doing themselves a favor by reading them, seeing as how I absolutely loathed this series. But hey! To each their own.
I really enjoyed them (althouth the first 3rd of The Subtle Knife dragged badly).
But, boy, did that kid have an amazing amount of blood in his body…
My feelings are it was a great Trilogy that failed to pay off in the end. It was a great read up until somewhere in the first half of the last book – then it fell apart. But up until then, it was fantastic – indeed one of the best imagined worlds created (and still better than Potter).
I guess my biggest disappointment was:
The war failed to live up to its promise – the resolution never reached the heightened expectations it should have – the suspense failed to happen, God just ceased to be in a poof (really more funny than terrible) and I never got the intense sense of a war or battle. I mean, really it should have been Ragnarok or Armegeddon or at least half as suspenseful and fraught with violence as Helms Deep. I know the author has some serious issues with religion and that’s fine, but that’s no excuse to peter out so badly at the end of a rip-roaring great story. I don’t know what happened, but my disappointment with book three was way worse than my disappointment at “The Saga Begins” (I think because I really didn’t have high expectations for Star Wars – but my expectations going into “The Amber Spyglass” was tremendous
ddgryphon, I would have to agree on the point about the war, but I didn’t feel that it retracted from the quality of the book too terribly.
I guess we should also say here that you definately should NOT read these books if you are deeply religious and can’t stand someone’s questioning of the merits of said religion.
I absolutely loved them.
FYI, I also did an appreciation thread a few months ago, coincidentally titled: His Dark Materials - wow.
I love these books too. I’ve recommended them to two people who don’t read fantasy. They’ve been converted. I don’t know how to tell them that it’s not all this good. 
No, the books aren’t perfect and there’s a bit of pontificating in the third book, but if Pullman wants to take a few pages and preach (or anti-preach), I’m okay with that. He earned the right with what he did in the first two books (and most of the third).
I just finished reading The Golden Compass and I have to argue with anyone who would call this children’s literature. Don’t get me wrong, I thought it was brilliant. I’m moving on to the next book after payday. But the first book was waaaaaay too brainy for kids. Not to mention dark.
I mean, why would something so intellectual be thought of as “children’s literature” anyway? To understand what the heck is going on you need a fairly good grasp on European history, theology, and the academic world in general. Discussions of elementary particles and original sin? Children’s literature my foot.
OK. At the end of the trilogy, God is dead and the Land of the Dead has been cracked wide open allowing everyone to escape. However, as far as the mortal worlds are concerned, nothing’s changed! The Evil Church™ is still in power on Lyra’s world, and the Shadow Government™ is still in power on Will’s world. Lyra is still Wanted: Dead or Alive™ by the EC. The SG still has an APB out for Will and Mary the physicist, but they just calmly go back to their world and say, “We’ll manage.” Philip Pullman has shot his own philosophy in the foot. He blames God for all the bad stuff in the world, but getting rid of God didn’t get rid of ANY of the bad stuff, so He couldn’t have been responsible for it in the first place!
I was halfway through the third book when I insisted a friend of mine read them. He says the only reason he’s forgiven me is that I hadn’t finished them yet – he was livid about the ending, not so much for the theological reasons boxed above (though he’s more of a believing Catholic than I think he realizes, but because
Lyra and Will can’t be together.
I adored them.
I have to admit that I really liked the books… but at the same time there was something about them that I really didn’t like. I can’t put my finger on it though (I’m not a great literary critic)
I really don’t know if I’ll ever read them again, but when I first read them I couldn’t put them down. I had to finish them. And I actually found it a bit sad with
the whole thing where Lyra and Will set up the spot where they would go back to once a year so they could be close to each other despite the distance between them.
The ending pissed me off more because of the whole
They can’t be together </sob>
thing than because of any of the other bits. That just struck me as unecessary.
It’s called “The Golden Compass”? In the U.K edition, the first book is titled “Northern Lights”, which seeing as Pullman is British, is, I guess, the intended title. Why they fiddle with these things for US publication, I dunno (like Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone). Is it referred to throughout the book as a “compass”?. In the U.K version it’s called an “alethiometer”. I guess “Golden Compass” is more consistant with the style of the titles of the other 2 books, but “Northern Lights” seem more evocative and intriguing to me.
As for my opinion of the books, I loved them, and so did the many people I recommended them to. It really is a spectacular feat of imagination. And I would disagree that it’s not a children’s book (though by children I’m talking about older kids than the H.P crowd- about 10+ I guess). Though they may not bring with them the background knowledge that an adult reader may have, they can still respond to the great storyline and vivid fantasy world- plus I’m sure they grasp a lot more of the underlying themes than we adults give them credit for.
Risksummon, you make some interesting points that I hadn’t really thought about before, I’ll have to re-read the books and think on them, but right now my take on the matter is
God is not the cause of all the bad things that happen. It’s more a case of self- determinism- God claims to be in charge, but does nothing- so better that God doesn’t exist, and we can all take full responsibility for our own actions. This is most clearly shown by the whole “Land of the Dead” episode- everyone, regardless of religious beliefs, ends up in the same place, completely forgotten by God. Lyra, a human, then forges a new path, so that those in the land of the dead can free themselves
(Hope this makes sense, I can’t really arrange my thought any clearer at the moment, having not read the books very recently)
Reagrding the anti-religious theme, the friend who recommened it to me is a person with quite strong Christian beliefs, and she obviously was not concerned about this element of the story- it shouldn’t concern anyone who has firm enough beliefs, IMO. I guess it should concern you if you are a parent that hopes to bring up a child in the Christain religion. However, I’m sure all believers meet thing in their daily lives that test their faith, and rather than not letting them read the book, I would think the best thing to do would be to let then read it, and then discuss with them how it is only one man’s opinion, that it is a fiction, not meant to be regarded as fact, talk about bits of the Bible where God says things that directly contradict things that happen in the book, etc, etc.
As a person of little or no religious beliefs (haven’t quite decided which yet) I find Pullman’s version of what happens to us when we die (after Lyra’s interevention of course), to be the best and most beautifully described explanation I’ve read yet.
I loved (still do love) the first two books, and was really looking forward to the third. It disappointed me so much that I’m not sure I’ll ever pick it up again. I agree with ddgryphon’s take on the second half of the book, and I thought the heavy-handed preachiness really marred it. I had thought better of Pullman before I read it.
Another weird thing (besides the title change to the first book) that happened with the American edition is that the quotes from Milton at the start of each chapter of The amber spyglass were taken out. I have the list, but it’s only a paper copy–there might be one online if anyone cares to look for it. And yes, the alethiometer is called that throughout the trilogy–I don’t know why the title was changed.
I thought the ending was perfect, though I did shed a few tears. Anything else would have been sappy and unrealistic. The entire trilogy is unstintingly tough and the ending is no exception. Pullman doesn’t pull any punches in the third book, which is why I think so many people have trouble with it. It’s hard to accept
that people who love each other don’t always get to be together, that loss of individual identity after death might be a fate preferable to an existence after death, and sometimes, even when Good attains a victory, everything is not happily ever after. A hard message for kids, so I’d want to be sure any kid that read it was emotionally prepared for it and willing to discuss it afterwards, but entirely worth reading and recommending, IMHO.
I thought the ending was perfect, though I did shed a few tears. Anything else would have been sappy and unrealistic. The entire trilogy is unstintingly tough and the ending is no exception. Pullman doesn’t pull any punches in the third book, which is why I think so many people have trouble with it. It’s hard to accept
that people who love each other don’t always get to be together, that loss of individual identity after death might be a fate preferable to an existence after death, and sometimes, even when Good attains a victory, everything is not happily ever after. A hard message for kids, so I’d want to be sure any kid that read it was emotionally prepared for it and willing to discuss it afterwards, but entirely worth reading and recommending, IMHO.
I consider myself a very religious person but this series didn’t offend me. I loved it! I had the same problem with the ending that a lot of other people had. This is my first time to post so I don’t know how to do spoilers yet. I’ll just say I agree with Rubystreak and Gadfly and found myself teary eyed, too. I also find it hard to believe it’s young adult. If any of you can recommend other series like this one, I’d love to hear them.This series definitely turned me on to fantasy.
I love this series! And I agree with Rubystreak’s take on it. Not a pulled punch by Pullman. I particularly liked the The Subtle Knife and, because of the risks Pullman takes in that middle part of the story, I think that any other ending to the series would not only have been wimping out but would have been dishonest and intellectually and emotionally insulting to readers.
I’ll recommend another tale by Pullman. Clockwork (great illustrations by Leonid Gore).