In preparation for the release of the film, The Golden Compass this fall, I just finished reading the book by Philip Pullman. If you read my preview of The Golden Compass you’ll know I had very high hopes for this series of books to replace the hole created in the hearts of many Harry Potter fans this summer once book 7 is released.

The Golden Compass is the tale Twelve year old Lyra Belacqua. The story begins simply enough. Lyra is an orphan who lives at Oxford where, she and her best friend Roger get into all sorts of mischief until Roger goes missing. From this simple seed the story of the Golden Compass grows into a wonderfully dark and complex tale, rich in fantasy and adventure. The Oxford at which Lyra lives at is in a universe parallel to our own.

On her quest to find and rescue Roger, Lyra learns dangerous secrets, encounters a host of colorful characters, and a wonderous object. There is the secret organization known as the Gobblers who are snatching children to be used in horrible experiments, a Golden Compass, known as an Alethiometer, which always tells the truth if you know how to work it (spoiler Alethiometer instructions), and a mysterious substance known as Dust which can bring together but is so feared that there are those who wish to destroy it. Oh and did I mention in this world, people’s souls manifest as small animals companions called Daemons.

The Golden Compass was much darker than I expected. I didn’t find it to be quite as whimsical as Harry Potter. The story was good and I enoyed reading the book but to some extent I found this book a little frustrating.

It was sometimes hard to figure out what is going on. While the world in which the book takes place is similar to ours, much of it is unfamiliar and there is no explanation of this. For example, the church is the dominant power in the world, the tartars and Skaelings rule portions of the north (scandinavia and russia?), but you never really get the big picture of the world which is the back drop for this tale. You have to figure it out on your own and just accept the story for what it is.

The book was good but if your going to read it plan on reading the entire His Dark Material trilogy because as you find out some interesting things at the end of the book it really doesn’t come to a conclusion. In fact I think I was left with more questions than I had answered. I’ll be interested to see how they handle the ending in the film this fall. It was good enough that I plan on reading the other two books, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass soon.

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