The Book of Dust: The Secret Commonwealth By Phillip Pullman

There is a hand holding The Book of Dust by Phillip Pullman, over a balcony.

The book cover has the authors name: Phillip Pullman, in big white letters at the top of the book.
The middle of the cover has the name of the book in large gold letters: The Book of Dust, with a small ferret/weasel poking its body out of the second O in book.
At the bottom of the cover, there is a  subheading in smaller white writing which reads: volume two The Secret Commonwealth.

The cover back ground consists of some trees at the bottom, going up to an aqueduct bridge on which a long steam trine is ridding across the top. There is the shape of single passenger in the third rear window. Further up there is a setting sun and mountains. 
Most of the imagery is done with darken silhouettes, such as the trees and the train, however the sun and mountains are outlined in lighter colours of yellow, orange and purple.

The second in Philip Pullman’s Book of Dust trilogy, this one is my favourite (out of two, as we’re still waiting for the third part).

I read his original trilogy, His Dark Materials, which first recounted the adventures of Lyra and her daemon (read demon) Pantalaimon when I was in secondary school and they were recommended by my year 7 English teacher, so it’s been a while. The first volume of the Book of Dust trilogy was published in 2017, seventeen years after the first trilogy was completed in 2000.

This one opens with Lyra and Pan back at their Oxford college, Lyra now in her early 20s and studying. The standout image of the opening chapters and indeed the book, is the changed relationship between Lyra and Pan, which is a bit painful to read given how close they were in the original series. We understand why as we get further into the book and it’s a shock to see how Lyra has changed, particularly under the influence of one particular book.

There are a wide variety of great characters, some recurring from the first in the trilogy – I always like to see how characters have changed between one book and the next and to see if you can understand why – can they be redeemed and do they need to be?

There’s no need for too much detail on the rest of the plot as it would be too easy to spoil things. Suffice it to say that Lyra and Pan need to find each other again, and quickly – as the search for the reality of Dust goes on.

A great read for anyone who likes fantasy, but fantasy grounded in reality, which asks questions and creates characters you really care about.

It can be read as a standalone, but will be much more enjoyable having read the two trilogies in order:

His Dark Materials:

Northern Lights

The Subtle Knife

The Amber Spyglass

The Book of Dust:

La Belle Sauvage

The Secret Commonwealth

Thirs still to come…

Review By Jonathan Freckleton, Senior Information Advisor at York St John University.

If you liked the sound of this book check out our review of La Belle Sauvage, the first volume in The Book of Dust series:

https://blog.yorksj.ac.uk/ysjlibraryblog/2022/01/28/review-of-the-book-of-dust-la-belle-sauvage-by-philip-pullman/

The Book of Dust: The Secret Commonwealth By Phillip Pullman

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *