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A review by floodfish
The Secret Commonwealth by Philip Pullman
3.0
If you’ve read all the other books in the series, crazy to stop now! Like the rest, at its best when it’s a good ripping yarn with interesting reflection on the possibilities of externalized souls (via daemons). In terms of HDM universe/building, there’s some new stuff and a fair bit of catching up with old stuff (some planned, some retconned, but it works).
Nice how easy it is to go along with the way the series makes leaps it does in time and place. The way it’s told in the eternal present works great. I was, however, misled by the title: I wish there’d been a less cloak-and-dagger spycraft and a lot more secret commonwealth (fairies/sprites/goblins/etc). The characters talk about it much more than they experience/interact with it. Other than daemons and alethiometers, there’s not even much in the way of unsecret HDM stuff (like witches and talking bears). Oh well.
I’m looking forward to reading what happens next, both plot-wise, and with the overall meaning/structure—this is a story about storytelling and I find that meta level actually helps rather than feeing contrived.
Like La Belle Sauvage, the pacing is lumpen. This book flags significantly in the 3rd quarter but manages to pick up in a big way towards the end.
Unfortunately, Pullman hasn’t made much progress in his long-standing blind spots about actual humanity, particularly around gender and race, (and the huge underlying speciesism/human exceptionalism). And some of the invocations of our-world problems (refugees, religious militias) feel ham-fisted and underconsidered. None of this is significant enough to sink the series, and he’s still far beyond a lot of classic fantasy/adventure, but it does make me look forward to more aware authors telling more aware stories.
Nice how easy it is to go along with the way the series makes leaps it does in time and place. The way it’s told in the eternal present works great. I was, however, misled by the title: I wish there’d been a less cloak-and-dagger spycraft and a lot more secret commonwealth (fairies/sprites/goblins/etc). The characters talk about it much more than they experience/interact with it. Other than daemons and alethiometers, there’s not even much in the way of unsecret HDM stuff (like witches and talking bears). Oh well.
I’m looking forward to reading what happens next, both plot-wise, and with the overall meaning/structure—this is a story about storytelling and I find that meta level actually helps rather than feeing contrived.
Like La Belle Sauvage, the pacing is lumpen. This book flags significantly in the 3rd quarter but manages to pick up in a big way towards the end.
Unfortunately, Pullman hasn’t made much progress in his long-standing blind spots about actual humanity, particularly around gender and race, (and the huge underlying speciesism/human exceptionalism). And some of the invocations of our-world problems (refugees, religious militias) feel ham-fisted and underconsidered. None of this is significant enough to sink the series, and he’s still far beyond a lot of classic fantasy/adventure, but it does make me look forward to more aware authors telling more aware stories.