very simple

After finishing the final Harry Potter book (and before I decide to read it again), I thought I’d take a crack at another well-recommended series of "children’s" books.  Both younger and yet more mature than the Potter books, these books tell the story of Lyra, Will and many others who are trying to piece the world back together again (and to wrench it from the control of the church), while others are simultaneously tearing it apart "for its own good".  I know from interviews with Nicole Kidman that they’ve apparently toned down the anti-church sentiment for the films, and while I can see that being done fairly easily for the adaptation of the first book, given it’s plot, I’m having a hard time figuring out how they would go about it for the second two.  Of course, it could just be a matter of semantics – no longer referring to it as the "church" and instead just making it an institution of some sort.  But the second and third books play very heavily into the idea of what sin and atonement mean. 

Anyway, this was an excellent series, it kept me on the edge of my seat, and now I have six weeks of back issues of The New Yorker because I kept bringing these with me on the bus to work instead of my usual magazines.

Tags: books