John Everett Millais, Portrait of a Girl (Sophie Gray)(December 19) I was taken by surprise by this little fantasy and then was completely taken with it.
A young girl, Lyra Belacqua, in a world not quite ours, decides to investigate a mysterious new scientific discovery. She must trick and undermine a lot of evil-doers, and learns a great deal about her own abilities along the way.
I guess I expected something like Harry Potter, but it’s not like that at all -- it's not cheerful and wouldn't-it-be-fun-if -- it's so much darker and more adult in every way (even though the protagonist is 12 years old). In fact, it's shockingly dark sometimes -- Lyra's parents are frightening and the world she's in is cold and ruthless.
The whole book is imaginative and original, but the main character, Lyra, is a huge factor in its charm. What a creation! She makes all my other favourite girl heroes -- Alice, Anne Shirley, Jo March, Scout Finch -- seem like ninnies. Yet she's still completely credible, as a girl and as a point of view.
I loved how it slowly emerges that Lyra is in a parallel world. There is no doubt from the beginning, with the daemons, that this is fantasy, but you aren’t sure whether this is our world in the future, having "gone wrong," or some kind of shadow world, or what. Pullman lets it dawn upon you in layers, letting you "solve" little mysteries about what people are doing and saying on your own, rather than explaining everything in detail ahead of the action, as even Lord of the Rings does, which makes everything more cartoon-y (I think).
The Golden Compass is subtle and disarming, plus very suspenseful -- I could not wait to find out what Dust was, and what would happen to Asriel and Coulter, and so on. Fun stuff.
A young girl, Lyra Belacqua, in a world not quite ours, decides to investigate a mysterious new scientific discovery. She must trick and undermine a lot of evil-doers, and learns a great deal about her own abilities along the way.
I guess I expected something like Harry Potter, but it’s not like that at all -- it's not cheerful and wouldn't-it-be-fun-if -- it's so much darker and more adult in every way (even though the protagonist is 12 years old). In fact, it's shockingly dark sometimes -- Lyra's parents are frightening and the world she's in is cold and ruthless.
The whole book is imaginative and original, but the main character, Lyra, is a huge factor in its charm. What a creation! She makes all my other favourite girl heroes -- Alice, Anne Shirley, Jo March, Scout Finch -- seem like ninnies. Yet she's still completely credible, as a girl and as a point of view.
I loved how it slowly emerges that Lyra is in a parallel world. There is no doubt from the beginning, with the daemons, that this is fantasy, but you aren’t sure whether this is our world in the future, having "gone wrong," or some kind of shadow world, or what. Pullman lets it dawn upon you in layers, letting you "solve" little mysteries about what people are doing and saying on your own, rather than explaining everything in detail ahead of the action, as even Lord of the Rings does, which makes everything more cartoon-y (I think).
The Golden Compass is subtle and disarming, plus very suspenseful -- I could not wait to find out what Dust was, and what would happen to Asriel and Coulter, and so on. Fun stuff.
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