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His Dark Materials sequel trilogy: The Book of Dust


Werthead

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Just downloaded this today, I'm absolutely charmed by the beginning of it. Maybe it has just been so long since I read something YA, but there is something wonderfully comforting about the way these opening chapters are written. I love young Malcom so far too

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Finished, not quite up to his dark materials, but a very good set up, Malcolm was amazing, he and Will would have been best mates and a force to be reckoned with.  I wonder what his long term story is, and where he was during HDM. 

Can't wait for the next one, which apparently is already finished.

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Loved this book, was probably closest to The Northern Lights in terms of quality for me, which will be good news for a number of posters on the board. The writing is instantly recognisable as Pullman and it’s really amazing no how instanteously I felt familiar with this world again, even when I haven’t revisited HDM in some time now. 

Echoing BigFatCoward, Malcom was great and can’t wait to read more about him. Alice also became interesting and likeable once she transitioned from “just some girl in the Trout.” 

Was fun seeing characters from HDM trilogy and learning more about the political situation. I might need to reread HDM again to check but it seems to me the Church is more overtly powerful in La Belle Sauvage than it is in HDM so I wonder if we’ll see them lose some of their hold over Britain in the coming books.

Really loved the magical otherworldly stuff that takes place in Part 2. I liked that Pullman drew upon Albion and invoked Arthurian legends, which is very appropriate given the setting of rural Britain. 

Things also seemed to get much darker in terms of content in Part 2. But then as was said several times...the flood changed everything :) 

llooking forward to the second book already!

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 26/10/2017 at 10:50 AM, BigFatCoward said:

Finished, not quite up to his dark materials, but a very good set up, Malcolm was amazing, he and Will would have been best mates and a force to be reckoned with.  I wonder what his long term story is, and where he was during HDM. 

Can't wait for the next one, which apparently is already finished.

I am curious where the next book is heading.

I am a bit concerned about what might happen to Malcolm, given the connection he feels to Lyra it does suggest something major must happen to him between this and

Northern Light for him not to show up in that. I wonder if there could be a falling out with the Oakley Street faction, I can't see Malcolm being willing to go along with some of their more morally suspect plans and they seem to be concealing plenty of things from their agents.

There also seem to be a few plot threads left hanging, Dr Relf seems to largely disappear from the story after the Flood but I suspect we may see more of her in the rest of the series. There's also the nuns who briefly captured Lyra who seem to be trying to prevent another Church faction (I can't remember if the priest was identified as being from the CCD) from getting hold of her.

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4 minutes ago, williamjm said:

I am curious where the next book is heading.

 

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I am a bit concerned about what might happen to Malcolm, given the connection he feels to Lyra it does suggest something major must happen to him between this and

Northern Light for him not to show up in that. I wonder if there could be a falling out with the Oakley Street faction, I can't see Malcolm being willing to go along with some of their more morally suspect plans and they seem to be concealing plenty of things from their agents.

There also seem to be a few plot threads left hanging, Dr Relf seems to largely disappear from the story after the Flood but I suspect we may see more of her in the rest of the series. There's also the nuns who briefly captured Lyra who seem to be trying to prevent another Church faction (I can't remember if the priest was identified as being from the CCD) from getting hold of her.

 

it is possible that Oakley Street could put him in a situation which ends in his death without his actually falling out with them. Not exactly unlikely considering their motivations for wanting to keep in touch with him - they are obviously not above endangering their instruments. 

However, I hope it isn’t that, but instead is somehow related to his passion for learning. Just hope that whatever happens doesn’t feel too retconn-y

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46 minutes ago, HelenaExMachina said:

 

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it is possible that Oakley Street could put him in a situation which ends in his death without his actually falling out with them. Not exactly unlikely considering their motivations for wanting to keep in touch with him - they are obviously not above endangering their instruments. 

However, I hope it isn’t that, but instead is somehow related to his passion for learning. Just hope that whatever happens doesn’t feel too retconn-y

There definitely other scenarios where he could plausibly have to leave Oxford. He (and Alice) could be forced into exile by the CCD if they get wind of their part in Lyra's relocation to Jordan College. I lost track a bit of who knows what, maybe the only people who knew they were are allied with Oakley Street, dead, or unlikely to say much about it like George Boatwright, but that's still quite a lot of people to keep a secret.

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2 hours ago, williamjm said:

 

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There definitely other scenarios where he could plausibly have to leave Oxford. He (and Alice) could be forced into exile by the CCD if they get wind of their part in Lyra's relocation to Jordan College. I lost track a bit of who knows what, maybe the only people who knew they were are allied with Oakley Street, dead, or unlikely to say much about it like George Boatwright, but that's still quite a lot of people to keep a secret.

 

I'm hoping he was serving Lord Asriel somewhere, who seemed fairly impressed with him, anyway i'm going for a drink at the trout this weekend so i'll see if Malcolm is around to answer himself 

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Finished reading it on Sunday night. Really lovely experience that made me long for an evening in front of an open fire with roast potatoes and apple pie. Not that it was completely comfortable - the hyena daemon and its owner were intensely creepy. At the start of the story I had found myself wondering what mental health was like in Lyra's world - whether there were fewer problems since humans could always talk to and confide in their daemons, and would be less lonely. I also thought that the world might be on average less violent because while people might still be overly willing to let themselves die, they wouldn't be able to bear seeing their daemons suffer. So it was interesting to see someone whom the HDM characters view as mad. 

Malcolm apparently has a mention in Lyra's Oxford, so I'll have to read that next!

Very happy to be drawn back to the HDM world again. 

 

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16 hours ago, BigFatCoward said:

 

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I'm hoping he was serving Lord Asriel somewhere, who seemed fairly impressed with him

 

That's also plausible, although I wouldn't say he's necessarily any safer with Lord Asriel than he is with Oakley Street.

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