Ooh. A book that's on my TBR pile even as it's being written: Philip Pullman's next installment of the Dark Materials series.
Called The Book of Dust, Pullman was reported as saying the book is his response to accusations that the previous three books portrayed organised religion as exclusively repressive. The book is also suppose to give better insight into his own atheistic belief. But what is it about, really? All I managed to dig out is this, according to The Times:
There has been much speculation about the contents of The Book of Dust. It was rumoured originally to be a reference book to guide readers around Lyra’s worlds, but it is now expected to be a novel. Pullman confirmed in 2003 that it would develop a storyline from Lyra and the Birds, set a few years after the end of The Amber Sypyglass and included in Lyra’s Oxford, a small companion volume to the original books.
Which still tells me nuts about the story.
Read about it here.
4 comments:
i've only read "northern lights" and "the subtle knife", but have enjoyed them, so i'd probably be keen to see what he comes up with with this new book.
it certainly is a very interesting world and premise he's come up with, so i'd like to read more about it.
the dust/religion issue is also a very touchy one, and one i'm not 100% comfortable with, so i'd be particularly interested to see how he addresses that...
I remember hearing about this years ago, right after I finished HDM, and being extremely excited about it. Of course, at the time it was meant to be a companion book. A novel is even better.
Although I'm not sure if a novel is the proper place to respond to accusations. But as long as he tells a good, meaningful story like he did in HDM, I'll be happy.
Jean Pierre I finally read the series last year and the books were enjoyable. But the theology bit - I liked it that it didn't intrude too much into the story. It was a story of rebellion - which I took as allegory and I was never that religious to start with.
But my question remains - what's the story of the next one?
Nymeth What I like about His Dark Materials is the world Pullman created - the sort of steampunk-magical alternative universe against ours. And of course the daemon - how I wanted a daemon of my own. :)
At least for me, the theology wasn't the reason why I liked the book. It was a great story, with lots of interesting and complicated characters - especially Mrs Coulter and that freaky monkey daemon of hers.
What I liked the most about the books was also the world and the characters. And the fact that it was just such a great story.
I'm an atheist like Pullman, so I relate to some of his ideas, although I'm not averse to religion the way he is. What I liked about the philosophy presented in the books was the fact that it was so life-affirming, in a "this is it, this is life, and it's limited, so let's enjoy every precious minute as much as we can" sort of way. That's the way I feel about my own life.
And I agree with you that the way these ideas were presented was not at all intrusive. He didn't hit you in the head with them, but rather let the story carry them. I really liked that as well.
I'm really curious about what the story of the next one might be.
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