His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass)

His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass) | Philip Pullman | Great books in one place

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His Dark Materials...

	His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass) Philip Pullman Laurel Leaf, 2003 average customer review:based on 1081 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

His Dark Materials

I picked up these books out of morbid fascination after seeing the movie and hearing a coworker talk about the book. I borrowed the first one from her and found my self intrigued so I bought the series and waited anxiously for the post man to deliver it. I found that I love these books! They are together a great work of fiction. They carried me to worlds I had never imagined through perils I would never have known. The characters are engraved in my heart. Each cut and bump and soul wrenching tear made me love them all the more. I wanted so badly for true love to win and triumph over evil and In the end I could barley see through my tears and with no truly happy ending in sight I love these books all the more.

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Great books in one place

The best part of this book is that it is actually all of Pullman's Dark Materials in one book. It is definitely cheaper than buying all the books separately.

Adapted as a screenplay in late 2007, The Golden Compass follows Lyra through her world of Oxford and beyond as she goes on a mission to rescue her friend Roger and the other children of the country (what would be England) suddenly start disappearing by the Gobbers. Along the way, she meets and collects a collage of supporters, from families of gypsies, an armored polar bear, and an aeronaut. Their mission is to save the children and find out what is really happening to them. The book, expectedly, explains more than what the movie actually shows, including reasoning for certain events and actions, as well as scenes that never made it to the movie.

The Subtle Knife starts in England, with Will finding an entrance to another world. In that new world, he encounters Lyra, and a knife that can cut through anything, including air space to make new openings to new worlds.

The Amber Spyglass deals with the upcoming war between two sides over science and religion. It also describes the conflicts that Lyra must face, including fulfilling the prophecy and saving the universe and all the parallel worlds, including Lyra's and Will's.

Personally, I didn't like the ending of the Amber Spyglass, but the books are a must read if you have lots of time to spare. Settle down for a long weekend. If you wait too long between readings, you can easily forget what happened when you last read. The suspense will keep you going until the last pages.

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His dark materials trilogy Phillip Pullman

Excellent trilogy. Once you start reading it you will not want to put them down.

A far cry from Harry Potter. Children's book? Hah!

Of course, I have never read Harry Potter. So basing my comparison with the first 3 movies of HP, I would say that this goes beyond the Harry Potter genre. Almost everybody reads Harry Potter. But His Dark Materials is not for everyone. To label this as a children's book is a grieve mistake for I am sure the little ones will miss the central message of the author. But as for adventure, it is non-stop and most people from all ages will absolutely enjoy it.

After watching the movie, "The Golden Compass" my sister bought the set. The movie had instilled an interest in me. The bear fight scene "Bears! Who is your King?" cheesed me out, which made me realize how OLD I am. So thinking that the book is targeted towards children, it took me a while to pick this up and finally after 4 months, I continued on with Lyra's adventure. But when I did, my whole week is automatically committed. For five days, my sister saw me flipping book after book after book.

THE GOLDEN COMPASS: I decided that I would start from the beginning. It is a general agreement that the book is always better than the movie, no? Except this time, I think the movie handled some of the scenes in the book much better. The movie moved and switched some of the scenes around but it still worked. Book fans bashed the movie because it left a big chunk of the book's ending. I wouldn't worry about it though because if they included the real ending, then it'll be much more of an excruciating cliff hanger. I don't think I could wait 3 more years to see next sequel. Still, several scenes has been skipped - important scenes and that's why in retrospect, the book is still better. But to put the movie in a better light, when I imagine the daemons and dust and those flying machines, I could refer back to the movie. Nicole Kidman is the perfect Mrs. Coultier! So in essence, the movie gives us a small peek of what goes on inside Philip Pullman's head.

THE AMBER SPYGLASS: Since I've watched the movie, the first book was not as exciting as the second one. The Amber Spyglass made me stay up the whole night. Lyra's new friend and another main character, Will, started off as an annoying character but proved to be as courageous, as smart, as likeable (if not more likeable) as Lyra. Looking back, this book was so jam-packed and I felt like I flew through the pages so quickly.

THE SUBTLE KNIFE: Finally, I think the series' tandem faltered a tiny bit in this last installment of Pullman's epic adventure. After building up so much intrigue and mystery, I was disappointed at the sloppy ending. He easily convinced me of the existence of the imaginary worlds he created but the most human and normal twist in the story fell out flat and forced. For twelve year olds, okay...sure, it's possible...but why can't I believe it? Well, I'm not spoiling anything.

Albeit the weak ending, this series will definitely one of those books I'll keep recommending throughout my lifetime.

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