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Friday, June 16, 2017

The Golden Compass Blog Tour (review)


I'm thrilled to have The Golden Compass Blog Tour stopping by to celebrate the anticipation for The Book of Dust, the upcoming follow-up to Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials Series, 


The Golden Compass
(His Dark Materials #1)
By Philip Pullman
First published in 1995
Yearling/Random House
Source: from publisher for review
Lyra Belacqua is content to run wild among the scholars of Jodan College, with her daemon familiar always by her side. But the arrival of her fearsome uncle, Lord Asriel, draws her to the heart of a terrible struggle—a struggle born of Gobblers and stolen children, witch clans and armored bears. And as she hurtles toward danger in the cold far North, Lyra never suspects the shocking truth: she alone is destined to win, or to lose, this more-than-mortal battle.

Philip Pullman's award-winning The Golden Compass is a masterwork of storytelling and suspense, critically acclaimed and hailed as a modern fantasy classic.

This Yearling paperback edition includes 15 pages of bonus material: some found letters of Lord Asriel, his scientific notes and other archival documents. This edition also features artwork by Philip Pullman at the opening of each chapter.


A New York Times Bestseller
A Newsweek Top 100 Book of All Time
An Entertainment Weekly All-Time Greatest Novel
Winner of the Guardian Prize for Children's Fiction
"Very grand indeed." --The New York Times

"Superb . . . all-stops-out thrilling." --The Washington Post

"A shattering tale that begins with a promise and delivers an entire universe." --Kirkus Reviews, Starred

"The Golden Compass is one of the best fantasy / adventure stories that I have read. This is a book no one should miss." --Terry Brooks



It has been many years since I first fell head and heart into Philip Pullman’s masterful His Dark Materials series, and re-reading The Golden Compass (His Dark Materials #1) for this blog tour has made me fall in love with this world and series all over again! I’ve so enjoyed journeying back into young Lyra’s world, a world full of daemons; Dust; grand colleges; fierce and armored bears; startling revelations; stunning places; irresistible villains; and unforgettable people.

With stellar storytelling, rich in lyrical, eloquent word weaving, and brilliant fantasy, smart science, captivating mystery, awe-inspiring adventure, and beautiful world-building, The Golden Compass practically radiates. The world Pullman has created, Lyra’s world, is an epic and gorgeously crafted one, with depth, meaning, and spirit. With old-world technology that feels surprisingly modern, mesmerizing settings, and careful attention to details, this is a world that enraptures, entertains, and impresses completely. Young readers will eagerly join Lyra on her misadventures around Jordan College and bravely journey with her towards the terribly exciting North.

I just love our complex, and relatable heroine, Lyra, who's a beautiful mix of inquisitive, brave, reckless, vulnerable, thoughtful, and determined. Lyra and her daemon, Pan, make for a wonderfully memorable and engaging pair. And of course, with a name like the Gobblers, the villains in The Golden Compass are deliciously devious, yet entirely unexpected.

The Golden Compass, and the entire His Dark Materials series, offers a powerful, profound, thought-provoking, and relevant story that inspires, entertains, and leaves a lasting mark. This is one series that readers, young and old, should not miss!

MY RATING
5/5 Cupcakes


PHILIP PULLMAN is one of the most acclaimed writers working today. He is best known for the His Dark Materials trilogy (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass), which has been named one of the top 100 novels of all time by Newsweek and one of the all-time greatest novels by Entertainment Weekly. He has also won many distinguished prizes, including the Carnegie Medal for The Golden Compass (and the reader-voted -Carnegie of Carnegies- for the best children's book of the past seventy years); the Whitbread (now Costa) Award for The Amber Spyglass; a Booker Prize long-list nomination (The Amber Spyglass); Parents' Choice Gold Awards (The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass); and the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, in honor of his body of work. In 2004, he was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire. It has recently been announced that The Book of Dust, the much anticipated new book from Mr. Pullman, also set in the world of His Dark Materials, will be published as a major work in three parts, with the first part to arrive in October 2017. Philip Pullman is the author of many other much-lauded novels. Other volumes related to His Dark Materials: Lyra's Oxford, Once Upon a Time in the North, and The Collectors. For younger readers: I Was a Rat!; Count Karlstein; Two Crafty Criminals; Spring-Heeled Jack, and The Scarecrow and His Servant. For older readers: the Sally Lockhart quartet: The Ruby in the Smoke, The Shadow in the North, The Tiger in the Well, and The Tin Princess; The White Mercedes; and The Broken Bridge. Philip Pullman lives in Oxford, England. To learn more, please visit philip-pullman.com and hisdarkmaterials.com. Or follow him on Twitter at @PhilipPullman


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