海角大神

More than 20 years after the publication of the incredibly successful 鈥淭he Golden Compass,鈥� Philip Pullman has traveled back to that parallel world with the release of one of the most anticipated books of the season, 鈥淭he Book of Dust: La Belle Sauvage.鈥�

Early reviews suggest Mr. Pullman has hit it out of the park once again.

鈥淭oo few things in our world are worth a seventeen year wait,鈥� . 鈥溾�橳he Book of Dust鈥� is one of them.鈥�

鈥淸T]he book is full of wonder,鈥� . Although the Times concedes that Pullman鈥檚 storytelling occasionally lags with 鈥渇lat dialogue,鈥� it nonetheless calls it 鈥渁 stunning achievement.鈥�

鈥淯sing the trappings of fantasy 鈥� multiple worlds, extraordinary creatures, extravagant adventures, quantum physics 鈥� it explores profound questions of good and evil, the nature of consciousness, the tension between religion and science, and what lies after death.鈥�

And predicted readers would love the book 鈥渨ith the same helpless vehemence that stole them over when 鈥楾he Golden Compass鈥� came out in the mid-90s, or even when they first met their partners or held their newborn children.鈥�

鈥淧art of this heightened experience relates to the electric emotional content that Pullman so deftly handles; part of it is his sure command of centuries of resonant English poetry and philosophy.鈥�

As if the release of 鈥淟a Belle Sauvage鈥� wasn鈥檛 enough for Pullman obsessives, more good news awaits fans of 鈥淗is Dark Materials,鈥� trilogy. The next book in this new trilogy is already finished.

鈥淟a Belle Sauvage鈥� is set 10 years before 鈥淭he Golden Compass.鈥� Set in Oxford, England, the story examines the environment in which Lyra Belacqua, the spirited girl around whom the previous trilogy centered, comes of age in an apocalyptic world in which libraries and public dissent no longer exist. Two children, Malcolm Polstead and a bitter teenager named Alice, battle to protect Lyra in this turbulent world currently enduring a Biblical-like flood, in which the rain 鈥渇ell not in drops but in sheets, and the ground was running with it, so that you couldn鈥檛 see anything solid: just flowing fields of bitter cold water鈥�.鈥�

It鈥檚 a crude, dangerous world in which the enemy is a fascist, authoritarian religious organization and its charismatic rapist-leader, and one Pullman, whose audience includes many youth, does not shy from.

Some have pointed out the frequency of swearing in the new books, an observation Pullman has scoffed at. about how many swearwords were in the book, Pullman replied 鈥減erhaps we ought to have a little insert in the front saying 鈥榮wearwords on page 456, watch out, swear word approaching next page, turn it over very quickly.鈥欌��

In one scene, a daemon, or doppelganger, loses a leg in a fight, and later, another.

鈥淭his hellhound of twisted gothic fantasy is truly ghastly, and fulfils a point of honor for Pullman,鈥� writes the UK's . 鈥淣o reader, child or other, need be spared. In imaginative fiction, sentiment, softness and sweetness are simply condescending.鈥�

For good reason, it seems. Pullman has told the press that 鈥淟a Belle Sauvage鈥� is a darker book than its predecessors, and has said it should be called 鈥淗is Darker Materials.鈥�

鈥淚鈥檝e got older and perhaps more cynical, closer to despair,鈥� . 鈥淚t is a darker book, I don鈥檛 deny that, but that鈥檚 the story that came to me and wanted to be told.鈥�