What a joyous thing to see this book arrive, the sequel to "His Dark Materials" and learn that it will be the first in a trilogy. It tells a grand tale of adventure and danger, as the young Malcolm Polstead rescues Lyra Belaqua and embarks on an epic journey down a mystically flooded river Thames. It doesn't quite match the thrill of the books which precede it, but in its surreal and mythic account of an alternative dimension, a secret commonwealth, Pullman extends his universe in other ways. The impression it left on me is that it was a poetic turn, the events were dreamlike, appealing to deeper cultural instincts. The religious extremism and oppression of the Magisterium remains firmly in place from the previous books.