The Book of Dust: La Belle Sauvage (Book of Dust, Volume 1)

This prequel to the author's His Dark Materials trilogy is less of a wide-ranging adventure than that story. A few characters recur here, with the infant version of main character Lyra at the center and younger versions of Lord Asriel and Mrs. Coulter seeming practically identical in character to they way they were portrayed earlier. The first part has a bit of light intrigue and conflict in the setting of fantasy Oxford, the last half takes place on the floodwaters inundating the Midlands and southern England depicting more peril and scary situations for young readers. None of the exotic settings in this version of a parallel Earth show up making it feel like a more miniaturized story. There are a few new characters given fairly detailed traits in the author's style along with one new villain with sinister motives looming over the young heroes Lyra and her two young adolescent caretakers. This made the book feel in a young adult or maybe middle grades book category rather than the more adult style of the earlier trilogy In the series title "Dust" refers to the main supernatural innovation distinguishing the story universe from our own, but none of the players except for the antagonist have much understanding of the concept.

The action of the story does not really fill in a vital part of Lyra's character arc that had thought was missing. I take it that the sequels to this volume jump forward past the timeline of His Dark Materials to fill in later plot points, which I am not eager to learn. The audiobook presentation was pleasant, but ultimately not of the same caliber as what went before, in my opinion.

3.5, if I could I truly enjoyed the book & its narration by Michael Sheen. I didn't read far into The Golden Compass, because at the time that NOS was at that reading level, the content was not appropriate for him yet. We tabled it; I never returned. I may read the His Dark Materials series if I love the Book of Dust series.

Elements of La Belle Sauvage bring to mind Diane Setterfield's Once Upon a River, which I read in January and found even more captivating.

3.5, if I could I truly enjoyed the book & its narration by Michael Sheen. I didn't read far into The Golden Compass, because at the time that NOS was at that reading level, the content was not appropriate for him yet. We tabled it; I never returned. I may read the His Dark Materials series if I love the Book of Dust series.

Elements of La Belle Sauvage bring to mind Diane Setterfield's Once Upon a River, which I read in January and found even more captivating.

Well that was disappointing. I loved the His Dark Materials books and their combination of imagination, action and big ideas and I looked forward to diving into Pullman's world again with the first in a prequel trilogy.

The story of La Belle Sauvage starts promisingly enough. Lyra is a baby and has been ordered into the protection of a nunnery near Oxford. Malcolm is a likable and plucky boy who works and lives with his parents at a nearby pub and often visits the nuns. The arrival of Lord Asriel to see his daughter draws Malcolm into a battle that is raging around the baby between the Magisterium and a secret network of spies called Oakley Street.

The witches in the north have a prophecy about the baby and others want to do her harm. During a violent storm and subsequent flood, Malcolm flees with the baby and Nancy, a serving girl, in his boat La Belle Sauvage across a drowned land.

The rest of the book - 50% of the text - centres on a series of adventures the three have, which become quite repetitive and have little to no bearing on the central plot. After a few chapters of this it begins to feel like incident for incident's sake. Filler. The central plot is also vague. There's talk of Dust and certain scientific research, but because Malcolm and Nancy are not part of the Magisterium or Oakley Street, their knowledge (and ours) is limited. 

The whole series of events (it's not a plot really) peters to a predictable end with the promise that something interesting or really exciting might happen in the next book. I don't think I can be bothered. 

Tout d'abord c'était un bonheur de retrouver cet univers qui avait baigné mon enfance et que je trouve qui n'est plus assez connu et apprécié aujourd'hui. Ce livre m'aura d'ailleurs donné envie de me refaire la trilogie originale avec un regard plus adulte tellement j'ai été surpris par la profondeur des thèmes développés que je n'avais pas forcément compris quand j'étais plus jeune. La Belle Sauvage est un retour aux origines, je ne m'attendais pas du tout à ce qu'il soit aussi proche temporellement de la trilogie originale c'est donc une très bonne surprise sur ce point, mais mes souvenirs étaient devenus trop flous. J'ai apprécié cette lecture mais elle n'a pas eu la même force que la trilogie originale, mais c'était un bonheur pourtant d'avoir tous ces souvenirs qui remontaient à la surface. A choisir j'aurais pris le temps de relire la trilogie originale, mais vu qu'il se passe avant je vais tenter de la relire avec un regard nouveau pour mieux la redécouvrir. Et je suis impatient de lire les deux tomes qui suivront !