His Dark Materials His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass (Book 1), Book 1, (Hardcover)

This is an excellent book that is being grossly misrepresented largely by people who themselves in fact have not read the books. They will tell you this is a book about children that kill God.... there is nothing further from the truth. The children DO NOT kill God, nor do they want to kill God. Rather this series of books is about two children and their pivotal role to save the world from the grips of fallen angels. The god that dies is not God himself, but an impostor who sought power and control over Creation. This series is based on Milton’s Paradise Lost and accordingly is a battle of good (the children and their supporters) versus evil (the fallen angels and their supporters). The book, as well as the series, is truly a page-turner. There aren't many books better than this!

Sure, it's a sad fact that you can't really ignore the cons in this book: (The Church Bashing, the Witches, the Dust.), Even though Pullman managed to lay them on a little thick toward the end, I hardly think they warranted all the bad hype toward the entire book/movie. I mean, you could just as easily take the Alethiometer, the Northerm Lights and the talking bears and, with a little work on the backstory, set them up in Narnia or Middle Earth. The one drawback for me was the fact that the Golden Compass as a plot device seemed buried underneath the forementioned cons. I would have liked to see it have more abilities to its credit.