znorgaard 's review for:

The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman

2.0

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I absolutely loved the first book in the series, The Golden Compass, for its amazing setting and world. It completely embraced the fantasy setting. Set up an interesting plot with a young girl trying to rescue her friend from some kidnappers doing crazy research. It included awesome things like armored intelligent polar bears, witches, 'demon' companions for everyone, and a sketchy government/church. The next book bled in to our world and decided to be even more overtly anti-religious instead of relying on more subtle aspects of the story. The final book returns to the fantasy setting and introduces even more crazy characters and creatures (which was fantastic), but goes even further with its blatant anti-religious aspects. If this wasn't a YA novel, I would probably be ok with it. However, it's a little jarring to read what starts out as a light-hearted story in an interesting world and quickly becomes a discourse on religion.

Luckily the world is interesting and the writing is solid.