The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials, #1)
Author: Philip Pullman
Rating: ā 4/5
Date Read: 2014/12/31
Pages: 351
The Golden Compass was my hundredth and, unless I manage to read another book in the three and a half hours until midnight, final book of 2014. Itās been a rough year, and when I initially picked this up I was looking for brain candy to escape reality for awhile. No such luck: while The Golden Compass purports to be a book for children, Pullman doesnāt shy away from grown-up conflicts. The Golden Compass serves as a reminder, to kids and adults, that we have to take the good with the bad. We canāt escape from reality; indeed, trying to can be more dangerous than facing it head on.
The Golden Compass is set in an alternate reality where religious dogma dominates politics, where scientific findings are twisted and manipulated to fit into a religious agenda. In this bleak landscape, the evil, power-hungry Mrs. Coulter haunts the dreams of children:
In other words, itās set in a world not so different from our own.
I canāt do the plot justice in this review, and I donāt want to try. I will say that I tore through it, and Iām looking forward to reading The Subtle Knife. With the rest of the series to look forward to, 2015 is looking better and better.