Lume

The Book Of Dust had no way of being as good as His Dark Materials were for me. I feel like because so much of the magic in HDM was how unexpected it came in my life and hit me right in the feelings, and picking up BOD, I expected to have that, and that is such a high expectation to come into a trilogy already.

I love the worldbuilding of BOD and how it expands on the adult themes that HDM doesn't really touch on. I love the fantasy in HDM and everything about Lyra that adulthood in BOD doesn't touch on. HDM feels like childhood wonder, BOD feels like growing up and realizing the world is broken and losing yourself in the cynism, but also finding your whimsy again. I understand the themes, but I don't like how they are portrayed in BOD.

I disliked Malcolm for a good part of the trilogy and only started to tolerate the guy when he was with the gryffons.

I hate what they did with Serafina.

I hate that talk with the angel, in a way? Like why retcon it and then not give me Lyra telling Pan about it and they planning to go find Will or something?

Also why not put Will in the book. Why. They were my first OTP. I was so hopeful to see them again.

I feel like BOD is like a very well done fanfiction from the HDM universe with a very solid worldbuilding and really great writing and different aspects, but that falls short on how many loose threads there are.

I feel like it talks about propaganda and the sheep like mentality Roger Waters goes over in Animals, and criticizes capitalism and doomer culture. I like all of these aspects.

And yet, I don't give a crap about so many characters. And yet, I feel like the ending was missing something to it.

I honestly ended the book thinking it was a hook to a fourth one and Pullman was going to pull a Sarah J Maas on the fans. Because that's it? We are not going to follow those stories Lyra will live and tell?

I love so many little details and the imagination angle and everything. I love the Myorama, as a Tarot reader that got into Tarot due to being the closest thing to an alethiometer our world has to offer.

Overall I feel like there should be more, but I am relieved that I don't hate these books. I was so afraid of hating them. I definitely won't cherish them like I did HDM and think of it as a separated entity, really, but not hating it is enough for me.

So somewhat lackluster but with it's good moments. I cried everytime Lyra and Pan interacted so there's that.

But honestly I did not care about so much stuff. I really was expecting it all to tie together at the end, and when it didn't.... it just fell flat.