What a fantastic trilogy! Words (my words, anyway) can't really begin to explain how excellent these books are. (These books are: The Golden Compass, (published as Northern Lights in England), The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass. Their author is Philip Pullman.) His Dark Materials is based (loosely) on John Milton's epic poem Paradise Lost, on which I may or may not have taken a college course solely because I wanted to become more familiar with the inspiration for Pullman's trilogy... Anyway, Pullman's trilogy is at least as epic as Milton's poem--to modern readers, perhaps it is even more epic, being written in modern English and in prose. It follows the tale of two children, one from a world like ours but different, and one from our world, as they struggle with... well, they struggle with all sorts of things, really, and you should read the series to find out what challenges they face! And there are all sorts of fascinating creatures--human and otherwise--that our heros encounter along the way, some who are helpful and some who are bent on destroying them utterly. No, that is not an exaggeration: indeed, Pullman is a master at creating very high stakes within these stories. Reading them, I, at least, feel as though the fate of the worlds really does hang upon the outcome of the events he's relating. Since I've already told you their titles, and how excellent they are, and vainly attempted to tell you a bit about their plot, all that remains for me is to exhort you to go out and read them if you haven't yet, and to go out and re-read them if you've already read them!
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