Praise for His Dark Materials

"Philip Pullman. Is he the best story-teller ever?"
Banner head-line, The Observer, November 2000

"... an important contemporary novelist..."

"...writes like an angel." "... he gives his readers precisely the satisfactions they look for in a novel: well-made, absorbing characters, supreme elegance of style and tone, a richly inventive imaginative landscape, and, finally, some very big ideas fearlessly explored."
Robert McCrum, The Observer, October 2000

"Philip Pullman has completed his extraordinary cosmological tour de force, the trilogy His Dark Materials. What he has written will undoubtedly become a classic. ... It is an astonishing imaginative feat. ... he has conjured a universe of an intensity and beauty that leave one gasping. ... for sheer inventiveness Pullman has no equal. ... Lyra and Will... have
far more blood and guts in them, than the inhabitants of Narnia or Middle Earth ever had."
William Waldegrave, The Daily Telegraph, October 2000

"Pullman rivals Checkov in his refusal to write small parts Or simple ones."
Claudia Fitzherherbert, The Spectator, November 2000

"The daemon is one of Pullman's brilliant imaginative constructs."

"...long ago George MacDonald taught us that the moral laws of all universes are the same; and, where the moral base is secure, as in this most wonderful tale it surely is, the metaphysics can look after themselves."

"Philip Pullman's accomplishment in this great work is to have wholly reconceptualised the nature and purpose of fantasy. ... Fantasy as Pullman recasts it, is not an alternative to realism but a dimension of it."

"Just tell them stories." If only we had heeded that wisdom."
John Pridmore, Church Times, January 2001

"This is remarkable writing: courageous and dangerous as the best art should be."
Erica Wagner, The Times, October 2000

"He is sophisticated, metaphysical, unhackneyed"
Kate Kellaway, The Observer, October 2000

"My mission recently has been to collar anyone I meet who is not already immersed in Philip Pullman's awesome
trilogy, His Dark Materials, of which The Amber Spyglass is the final volume, and persuade them of the glittering brilliance of it."

"...a thunderingly good story..." "...truly nail-biting stuff..."

"Much has been written about this extraordinary, multi-layered masterpiece which can be read at many levels. But the main point of it surely is that tells an incredible story - one that will harness the imaginations of children and adults now and in the future generations."
Carla McKay, The Daily Mail, December 2000

"These are my desert island books; about half way through I have to limit myself to reading only a couple of pages at a time in order to delay as long as possible the moment when they must end (its impossible to read each page slowly; Pullman is such an original and compelling storyteller that his books make reading an aerobic activity; they literally leave you breathless.)"

"...destined to become a classic."
Sara O'Reilly, Time Out, November 2000

"Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy is one of the great imaginative works in the English language. It creates a universe so atmospheric and tangible that even now I am convinced it exists - somewhere. It is a gripping epic, set in a wonderfully intriguing world (or rather worlds). It sets out on a soaring arc of imagination that sustains and pays-off
in the most masterful way - and yet all the way through it touches on human truths and insight. Oh! And it contains one of the best villains in all literature."
Terry Jones, film-maker, founding member of Monty Python and author

"What it offers is an intellectual challenge as to the essential nature of the human and the divine that few intelligent individuals, be they adults or children, will be inclined to resist."
Amanda Craig, New Statesman, October 2000

"Philip Pullman's writing...is both powerful and subtle."

"...there is no one anywhere near as good as Philip Pullman in this genre; this was well worth waiting for."
Minette Marin, The Daily Telegraph, October 2000

"Philip Pullman - Children's author of intellectual epics"
Contents page, The Daily Telegraph, October 2000

"His Dark Materials stands revealed as one of the most important children's books of our time."
SF Said, The Daily Telegraph, October 2000

"Pullman is a brilliant writer." "...Philip Pullman, capable of lighting up the dullest day or greyest spirit with the incandescence of his imagination."
Nicholas Tucker, The Independent, October 2000

"If anything, The Amber Spyglass, is more intense than its predecessors. The climaxes are bigger; there is fresh fire
in the writing; and there is a wonderful new cast of characters."

"(His Dark Materials)... an exhilarating and poetic mixture of adventure, philosophy, myth and religion enriched by a heady brew of quantum physics."
Julia Eccleshare, The Guardian, October 2000

"...reaches the imaginative and emotional power that we have come to expect of this trilogy."
Nicolette Jones, The Sunday Times, October 2000

"It is dark, dense, exciting and beguiling - some of the richest modern fiction..."

"...his tales for older readers - from nine to 99 at least - have made the critics really purr."

"...richly-woven stories..."
Dave Hill, The Evening Standard, November 2000

"Pullman is a charismatic storyteller... lively dialogue and intense description."
Susanna Rustin, Financial Times, November 2000

"Philip Pullman's trilogy is lavishly inventive. "
Julia Briggs, Times Literary Supplement, December 2000