The Book of Dust- A mid review

 

By: Muhammad Iftikhar 

The Book of Dust is an interesting, slow-moving one that accomplishes a lot, but very little at the same time. The story starts out following a young boy Malcolm Polstead’s day-to-day life working in the inn his parent's inn. The beginning of the story is honestly pretty slow as it goes through Malcolm's school day, the work he does at the inn, and his boat rides on La Belle Sauvage (this rowboat that he used to go down the river close to the inn). In Malcom's world, every single human is accompanied by their own animal counterpart, who shares their thoughts, and pain, and live the exact same day-to-day life as they are inseparable from their humans. They’re essentially their human best friends, and they’re called Daemons. One day when Malcom was on a boat ride with this daemon Astra, he saw a man drop an item on the ground. The man goes on a frantic search to find his lost valuable, however, he’s taken away by two men in some time, and he disappears. Malcolm and Astra retrieve the item (which happens to be an acorn), and the boat home. They find a secret message in the acorn which they have trouble interpreting, and they find out the next day the very man they saw drop the acorn, has mysteriously died.

However, even after the mysterious death, the story does not speed up, but at the same time, it doesn't become boring either. Malcolm is an active member of his community, constantly looking to help out the church and other businesses that need him to run errands. On one particular day, Malcolm goes to the church near the inn and finds out that they’re now responsible for a small child named Lyra, and immediately, he creates an emotional attachment with her. He doesn’t know it at the moment, but Lyra would be a large part of the next couple of weeks of his life. 

One day while at school, a guest came and announced a program called “The League of St. Alexander”. This league encouraged students to report bad behavior for the sake of Christianity, while in reality, it did the opposite. The students of the school abused this and began reporting teachers they disliked, and these teachers would often end up disappearing. He would eventually see the same people in charge of the League of Alexander at the church where Lyra was. Now, during this time Malcolm was tracked down by Dr. Hannah Relf who used a device called an altimeter (it's this device that requires a lot of knowledge and textbooks to use, but it essentially can answer any question), and she asks him for the acorn. Malcom’s honesty and intelligence during their short conversation convinced her to recruit him as a spy of sorts, so he could update her on things such as “The League of St. Alexander, business at the church, and other local issues she couldn’t keep up with (she worked for an organization called “Oakley Street”. Oakley street wasn't that big of a deal in this book, will play a larger role in the next).

Now, around here it's been like 150+ pages, and you can see very little actually happened, however, this is where things start speeding up a bit. One night the father of Lyra who’d been in hiding, Lord Nugent, came to see her, and when officials came after him, Malcolm aided him in his getaway by providing him his boat “La Bella Sauvage” so he could get away. In addition, Malcolm spots a mysterious man with a daemon of a hyena with only three legs. To add to this man’s mysteriousness, he witnesses him torturing his own daemon, something Malcom had never witnessed. Malcolm also sees this figure trying to get into the church, partially by making friends with many of the nuns and even the kitchen staff at the inn, as well as attempting to break in during the night. 

Malcolm knows what's up, however, he can’t do much about it. A week or two pass by, and Malcom receives a visitor at his house. It was someone whom Lord Nugent had sent. In addition to returning Malcom's boat (with repairs and new features), he also warned Malcom of an incoming storm, one that would bring one of the worst floods there’d been in decades. This news is unbelievable as the weather had been returning to its peak, however, Malcolm took the warning seriously. Malcolm had gone around warning many around his small town of the incoming flood, however, no one but Dr. Relf and his parents took him seriously. 

One night, Malcolm spots the mysterious man approaching the church, and the kitchen staff who’d already been approached by him named Alice, also joined him. They snuck into a shed and watched him try to charm his way into the church, however at that moment, the slow drizzle had increased into storm, and the river near the inn which was already near being full, began flooding. Immediately Malcom and Alice ran into the church and retrieved Lyra, and they saw the mysterious man attempting to do the same. Once he saw they had Lyra, he pursued them, and Malcolm and Alice were on the run. With Lyra in hand, they jumped in “La Bella Sauvage” and rowed away in the flood waters, seeing their whole town being destroyed. 

Although I’ve already told a lot of the story, if there is a part you really want to read, it's his journey in the flood waters with Alice and Lyra, and how they manage to narrowly evade the mysterious man on many occasions, so I won't spoil anymore. Overall, the Book of Dust is a good read. Even though it moves quite slowly, the author Phillip Pullman really takes his time detailing everything, and focusing on character growth. He immerses the reader in the world that Malcolm is living in, while also leaving it mysterious. A big thing Phillip Pullman leaves out is any symbol of what the time period could possibly be. There are mentions of helicopter-type vehicles, however, at the same time there are no cars, no telephones, and there are still castles around, so it’s quite confusing. Still, it also urges the reader to immerse themselves in the world more and make them ask more questions. In conclusion, I’d give the Book of Dust a solid 8.6/10.