The Golden Compass: A-

To those who keep complaining about the theological subtext of Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy (of which The Golden Compass is the first installment), I steadfastly reply: get over yourselves; have some fun. Ok, sure, if you're on the lookout for some menacing "God isn't real!" lecture lurking within the pages of Pullman's (an avowed atheist/agnostic) prose, you might pick up crumbs within this first book; but those crumbs are far out weighed by the author's neat prose, brilliant use of perspective, subversive imagination, and dry wit. And certainly for myself (an avowed reader/critic), all these elements add up to one fun time.

But, of course, let's start with the controversial stuff. First off, what it amounts to in Compass is very little considering the brouhaha surrounding the soon-released film adaptation; sure there is a vast, powerful Church in this other world (one vaguely resembling our own, minus roughly a century or so and plus a lot of panache) that seems almost entirely malevolent; sure, too, the main character asks at one point (in refernce to Adam & Eve) "Yes, but wasn't that all just a sort of fairy tale?" But beyond that, very little else.

So what truly remains in these 400-pages beyond an antagonistic Church and a doubtful protagonist? The real workings of a real fantasist. Pullman, previously the purveyour of more contemporary young adult fiction, loses himself and the reader in a clever, subtle, re-working of our world. The new additions include daemons - the physical manifestion of a person's soul (aka, a sort of familiar that takes various shapes depending on personality) - witches, talking polar bears, and experimental theology. This last bit is surely the author's most daring step, and it pays off big in the first novel. As it seems in Lyra's (our hero) world, the Church pre-emptively captured the scientific lightning that was about to strike with the Renaissance by aligning themselves with all these new-fangled "elementary particles" (read: atoms), etc. As such, all scientific discoveries flow through the Church, and their doctrines in turn reflect the glory of science as the Glory of God. As a critical reader, I couldn't have been more delighted at this invention. As a mere human, prone to lose oneself in their books, I fell quite in love with the shadowy mysteries of this vast beauracracy (no longer headed by a Pope, mind you, but re-worked into the Magisterium, a lose working group of "councils, commitees, and the like").

So what mysteries do they portend? Well, the coming of Dust for one - a substance that attaches to a child once they hit puberty, and the cause of much concern for the "all-knowing" Church. Another puzzle they bring is the blossoming of Lyra's destiny - and how she is to "end destiny". Sound impossible? Not so when you have a compass-like alethiometer that sees the answer, if you can see the question; an armored guard of a bear named Iorek; a gyptian consort who lead you to the far North to rescue kidnapped children and father's alike; and a daemon who'd follow you to another world.

Which, in some canny sense, Lyra is. See, by quietly playing up a child's sense of wonder and dread, then intermingling it with Lyra's street-urchin skill, Pullman keeps the reader tethered to a world that unfolds with all the blazing new passion as Lyra herself experiences. Another bonus? It allows quick, surprising turns of plot and character to manifest in barely a pages' time (due again to Lyra's undoubtedly weak grasp of "truth" in her world's time of so-called "high political tension"). It is quite the clever stroke to create such a perspective for the reader; and more lithe still to never have it feel claustrophobic or improbable.

One great benefit against this last thought is in the characters created to populate Lyra's Earth: there is Mrs. Coulter - a charming manipulator, Lord Asriel - a prideful explorer and Lyra's uncle, John Faa - the absurdly wise king of the gyptians, and Serafina Pekkala - a seemingly ageless witch queen who still loves her human savior of 40-years. As is obvious, these are fascinating creations and more fascinating still because we can hardly guess what they truly want, or who they are (a surprising betrayal near book's end will have you recast your entire alleigances). Due to this, and among various other attributes, one must invariably draw the conclusion: The Golden Compass is conceived as fantasia, but cast in a cold, diamond-hard die giving it both the inventions to support dis-belief, and the suspenseful desire to do just the opposite (I dare anyone not to be swept into a desperate thrist for discovery when it comes to the mysteries of Dust, the Aurora, and the Magisterium). Who'd have guessed all of it would come from a "non-believer"?