The Amber Spyglass : His Dark Materials Book Three

Rating:
Summary: Beautiful but can be disturbingly provocative
Review: (...)

These are books aimed at children and written in that vein. The heroine is a 12 year old girl (verging on 13). The books are couched in the fantastic and the allegorical. However, that is not to say that Pullman does not take his readers seriously. He is absolutely unflinching in his portrayals-including those involving violence and disappointment. These are the ways in which they begin to appeal not just to children (who so desperately crave to be taken seriously) but to adults as well. These books have enjoyed some astonishing success and they are well-deserved. Their influence on the genre will be in their presence-we don't think that many authors will attempt to imitate Pullman because they will be too timid to do so. He cannot be matched for how brutally honest he can be with the youth. It will be interesting to see how His Dark Materials will survive the test of time but because they are so antithetical to so many deeply entrenched "traditional values" we think that they begin to suffer a swift decline in future generations as the fear Pullman engenders in other authors will also be felt by parents when recommending books to their children.

WHO SHOULD READ THIS:

A difficult question to put to these books! Indeed, who should read them? Precocious and intelligent children should be introduced to His Dark Materials for they teach and celebrate simultaneously imagination, history, engineering, and physics. For many young readers, these books may be the first that seriously challenge their notions of justice, faith, and adulthood. There is such a great deal to admire about these books and parents trying to suppress them may in fact spur children in to reading them with greater furor. For wit, plot, and technique Pullman is certainly a match for anything Rowlings is doing (if not her equal in reaching larger audiences).

WHO SHOULD PASS:

Very conservative religious parents will be appalled by the last half of the trilogy. In fact, religious adults who read these books often complain of how profoundly annoyed and attacked they feel. Considered and educated readers will sense what we mean when we say Pullman's arguments become a bit facile by the end. Really, it's too bad--though how it could be avoided, we don't know--that His Dar Materials tackles the notions of faith in the way they do because in all respects they are very finely crafted and well-worth the time to read.

(...)

Rating:
Summary: So sad ...
Review: ...that some readers with shuttered minds would call this work of *fiction* a "lure into satanism".
I am an adult, and thought this series was delightful, marvelously written and wonderful interpretation of "Paradise Lost". (Milton was not exactly luring people into "satanism" in the 17th century.)
If you are feel drawn to "satanism" by this book, then perhaps you need to take a close look at your own faith. I once read a book called Galatians, which talked about the fruit of the spirit being love. Hmmm. Who draws a more brighter picture of love--Philip Pullman and his depiction of love between a person and their daemon/soul or the reviewer and their excoriation of this book series?



Rating:
Summary: A Book that Makes You Think--- Hard
Review: After reading "The Golden Compass" and "The Subtle Knife," I was left dangling from a cliff wondering how Pullman could possibly manage to pull the pieces of the plot together into a coherent ending. After waiting for nearly two years, reading "The Amber Spyglass" was especially rewarding. Richly written, Pullman's novel gracefully weaves the strands of plot together into an exciting, thought-provoking masterpiece. His ideas regarding religion and the deceptiveness of the Church were particularly intriguing to me; the thought of God as a Great Deceiver thrills me, because no writer I have ever read has ever written such an idea in such a popular franchise before. I also loved his idea of the Fallen Angels being on the side of right and goodness rather than being demonic underlings. The concept of Dust, or Dark Matter, being the basis of all spiritual existence is thrilling, and his ideas regarding the psyche of the maternal mind are interesting. However, the most dramatic portion of the novel would have to be the dramatic closing chapters. They are so well-written, and the characters have been so highly developed and embraced by my heart, that the tragic end actually drove me to tears during the entire final five chapters. I truly hope, as do many, that Pullman will relent and add a fourth installment to this groundbreaking series; the open ending is just too much to handle, and leaves me hungering for more. A truly well-written novel not only entertains you, but challenges your pre-formed conceptions and beliefs. Pullman's novel accomplishes this in spades, and deserves to be studied intensely.

Rating:
Summary: Oh my God get over it.....
Review: Any Christian that is insulted by this story should never ever touch a FICTIONAL book.
Oh well yeah, this is HERESY, of course. Beside that it is a very well written and heartbreaking story.
It's a Fantasy Trilogy for God's (I'm sorry) sake and I rather let my children read an open minded book like this and tell them of the twist of religion and science than let them read faihtfulcatholic stories. That's maybe appropiate for children under twelve...I think above that age, they are ready for a little bit of truth (please regard the "little bit"), aren't they?

Rating:
Summary: Brings the series to a magnificent and grand conclusion.
Review: First off... this ain't no Harry Potter. While Harry Potter is excellent, thiese books are mor thought provoking and intelligent. Sorry to all the die-hard Potter fans out there for saying that. Now, about the way it's written. Phillip Pullman has a gift for describing epic battle scenes that can give Tolkien a run for his money. You could even go so far as to say that the heavenly war at the end compares favorably to the battle of the Pellenor Fields in LOTR, which is definitely saying something. Also, Pullman gives us the rare ability to pity, hate, and love some of the characters. Lord Asriel, Lyra's dominatining father is one of these.

Regarding the content itself, well, let's just say that we won't be demanding any new cover anytime soon. Call me crazy, but for some odd reason I really dislike dust-jackets, and with a book such as this, with a picture on the actual book, I just trash the dust-jacket. In this case it has a positive effect. You don't see the title, just the full erie splendor of the front cover, showing the land of the dead, with Will and Lyra as the only bright things in that utterly dismal wasteland. And you can just make out the faces of the dead, a pretty macabare vision, if I say so myself. Nice thick paper, wierd symbols on the edge of the pages, and a nice mystical font on the chapter names. No problem there.

Onto the long-expected plot summary: The book opens with Lyra.... wo is being drugged by her mother in a small cave in her world. Now a neighborhood girl named Ama finds out what Mrs. Coulter is doing and plans to help the girl escape. Meanwhile, right after the death of his father, Will, along with two angels, Baruch and Balathamos, has gone looking for the missing Lyra. In another plot line, the scientist Mary Malone has gone into another world and meets strange wheeled creatures called mulefa. All of them meet and together, their destiny changes all the worlds.

Ths book will make you laught, cry, and generally leave you in awe of how utterly amazing this book is.

Final grade- "A+"

Adieu

Rating:
Summary: A superb work laced with Nietzschian undertones
Review: I read the first book in this series when i was in sixth grade, and finished the last one in Ninth Grade. I loved them then and loved them now (hell, i've read the whole trilogy four times). But recently i have gained a whole new appreciation for them. Having become enamoured in Nietzschian philosophy i have found numerous relations between the message in The Amber Spyglass and Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Pullman's view of whats wrong with christianity is essentially the same as that presented in Zarathustra. Both present the idea of living for a world that for all you know is not there as an effront to life itself and all it has to offer. These are the preachers of death. The depiction of the fallen angels as friends of wisdom is also a very Nietzschian idea.

Rating:
Summary: This is supposed to be an award winning book???
Review: I was horrified after reading this novel. After all the insanity about Harry Potter I can't believe those books have been slandered and I never heard anything about the evil in this last novel of this series.

I'm not conservative or fundamentalist, in fact, I probably hate organized religion as much as Philip Pullman does, but this was really over the line. My major complaint is that it is a childrens book. I'm an adult and I was deeply disturbed by the horrors in this book. I can't imagine having read this book if I were 10 or 11, as a parent I'm deeply disgusted. I've never wanted to burn a book before in my life, but this one I had a strong urge to. If I hadn't gotten the book from a library I probably would have.

My second big complaint is that this book is not entertaining in the slightest! Will and Lyra's characters and development fade into the depressing background of the morbid story. The afterlife as a horrific prison camp even babies are sent to? God disintegrating in the wind? Not to forget 'deaths' which are spirits that hang around you your whole life just so if you kick off they can lead you to the aforementioned hell. Nice. I like excitement in the plot, but after this mindnumber I wanted to down a bottle of Prozac and go into a coma for a week or two.

I won't even comment on the fact that the author had two prepubescent children have sex in order to SAVE THE WORLD. Gag me and give me a break. Oh well, I guess I commented on it afterall.

Rating:
Summary: soppy and nonsensical
Review: I'm sorry to say that Pullman's main achievement in this last book is to create yet another soppy paean to adolescence. I was really disappointed in the weakness of the plot and characters. Through most of the book, Pullman is crudely trying to jerk the reader's emotions around... Oh, the sadness! Oh, the joy! Oh, the tragedy! It's all surprisingly amateur, simplistic, and it doesn't work. At least not for an adult reader. But I couldn't like this kind of sci-fi hackery even when I was an adolescent myself. Oh Asimov, Tolkien, where are thou???

Rating:
Summary: New Age Harry Potter
Review: The "His Dark Materials" trilogy is written like the unsuccessful love-child of the Celestine Prophecy and the Harry Potter books. I just read that the author is an atheist, but that seems odd since the core of this story is New Age hokum. While the Catholic Church is a den of the most horrid iniquity and the Christian God turns out to be a senile Alzheimer's patient (though power-mad and wicked before senility arrived), even the "physicist" finds honesty and guidance in the I Ching. Witches, angels, herbal remedies, divination, auras... you get the idea. One of the main characters (Lyra), even has a portable wigi board-like device called the altheiometer that she consults throughout the books to find the "truth."

In this Age of Aquarius, the World of the Dead (literally the underworld) sections are the most painful reading. When Will and Lyra find the solution to the misery of these poor dead souls, it's so silly and uninspired I couldn't imagine what the author was thinking.

By the third book, the characters have become cardboard cutouts that can change their essential natures as quickly as the "dust" wind can blow them. And the ending-oh, the ending! Abandon hope all ye who exit here...

I can't say that this trilogy is a complete waste of time. The first two books were mostly fun (although sometimes preachy) and I generally liked both Will and Lyra. By the beginning of the third book, however, I had to start skimming to keep myself awake.

Be aware that for "young adult" fiction, this book is particularly gruesome with graphic torture, murder, dismemberment, and (essentially) cannibalism.


Rating:
Summary: A Perfect Conclusion to A Stunning Triology
Review: The Amber Spyglass, Philip Pullman's final book in the His Dark Materials Triology, is truly well-written and a satisfactory ending to the saga of Lyra, Will, and the friends. The action alternates throughout the book switching from the experiences of Will and Lyra (which include the Land of the Dead. I can not explain without ruining the book), Dr. Mary Malone, who meets creatures who can see the elusive particle dubbed DUST, and the crusades of Lord Asriel and Mrs. Coulter. New characters are also introduced and old ones are brought back to finish the story. However, the end might just tear your heart out. I honestly couldn't stop thinking about the book after I read it. Though Mr. Pullman sometimes stretches the believability of his story, it remains to be a member of three of the most well-written and stunning pieces of literature ever created.