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This review only applies to book 1: The Golden Compass

Growing up with an addiction to Dungeons & Dragons and reading through my town library's entire Science Fiction and Fantasy section before I was sixteen has left me with a life-long proclivity for the fantastic. Some of my favorite novels manage to combine the highly literary (or experimental) with the fantastical. I'm willing to take a chance on books considered straight fantasy or science fiction, but I haven't been making the best choices this year other than Kraken. I gave Golden Compass a chance having found that many GR folks including friends have given it top marks. I didn't realize it was considered YA fiction nor had I seen the movie.

Frankly, I was underwhelmed. I had expected the next Lord of the Rings and this was nowhere near the sophistication of that work.

First to the good:

I appreciated a certain feminist sensibility that surrounded the main character, Lyra. Early on in the book it was directly called out that females were "not permitted" to enter the private club area of the college where she was raised...but she snuck into it anyway, ignoring the rules. And this event led to all that followed. She was a clever street smart girl who despite her diminutive size and youth is directly responsible for saving the day. She is the heroine through determination, compassion, and wit.

I felt enough urgency in the plot to want to know "what happens next." It kept me reading.

The Gyptian tribal people demonstrate a certain level of "town hall" democracy in their decision-making process. It was nice to see the sort of communal Q&A between leader and individuals that doesn't happen in our society. Although, they still had a leader, he seemed to rule more by moral strength and fairness than by force or even by convention.

Now to the not-as-good:

I did not get the deep believability from the characters that the best writers manage to create. I never bonded with the main character nor her friends to the extent that they felt real. Neither did the villains of the piece. They seemed even more exaggerated and one dimensional than the rest.

The Gyptian tribe seemed rather like a cross between Gypsies and Native Americans, and they were a bit too "perfect." As in, the noble savage.

Occasionally weak logistics. By that I mean, when a writer needs to create an actual physical experience such as a fight or moving a character through a house, they must deal with logistics. Describing the actions in a way that allows the reader to visualize the event without bogging it down without too many words and mucking up the pace of the narrative. At times, I found Pullman's logistics awkward or vague. Distances were unclear and timing was off.

Some of the relationships felt forced. Lyra manages to convince a warrior bear to join her quest and before you know it she "loves" him (in a platonic way). The build of this love was not very convincing--it seemed more like a device contrived by the author in order to increase the drama and emotional weight of the danger experienced by the bear.

Lastly, I'll comment on the accusation of "anti-Christianity" some have leveled at this book. I was really looking forward to some bold blasphemy but found nothing of the kind. The book seems to actually endorse the premise that literal souls exist although it manifests our souls as visible spirit animals bonded to each human. There is a running theme through the book that the fictional Church is trying to hide certain revelations that might bring into question orthodox religious doctrine. And they are willing to do cruel and violent things to hide them. But this doesn't call into question religious beliefs so much as it simply accuses a religious institution of corruption. Even Roman Catholics recognize that their church has done horrible things in the past such as endorsing the burning of witches and so-on. Popes have fathered kids. Priests have molested kids, and the church covered it up. But all that doesn't necessarily invalidate Christianity so much as certain institutional behavior. So overall, nothing much to get excited about there. Although, I am modestly curious whether Pullman will go further in the subsequent books, I did not find this compelling enough to read further. End of story.