"Did you read all that today?"
"Yeah."
"Good God, woman."

Today, I read The Ruby in the Smoke by, if you hadn't guessed, Philip Pullman. You know what I don't understand? --I've been reading The Amber Spyglass, also by Philip Pullman, for the past month. I can't get through it. So I decided to pick up the first of his Sally Lockhart books this morning, which I bought the same day as The Amber Spyglass, and I haven't been able to put it down until a few minutes ago--it's 10:30 pm. I did roughly the same thing with his other book, The Golden Compass.

So what is it exactly about The Amber Spyglass that makes it hard to get through? I think it has something to do with the fact that it's the last in the trilogy, and you can tell Pullman's just tired of writing it. It has a distinctly forced feel to it, and makes you think he only wrote it because the story he'd pulled through to a third book wasn't quite finished; he made it too long, too full of angst, and too full of the same sentence structure over and over and over again. You get sick of one sentence paragraphs, you get sick of dramatic wording, you get sick of repetition there only for the sake of emphasis. I'm even sick of the characters; they've lost themselves somewhere along the way, which is startling, because Lyra, the heroine, used to be one of the strongest personalities I've ever encountered in a book. She's still rounded, sure, but she doesn't work well with a sidekick. Or rather, she doesn't work well as a sidekick--her role has been watered down by a second main character, Will, to the point that she becomes almost a background character (which is, perhaps, an exaggeration, but if the plot's going to revolve around her, we need something with a little more focus).

The Ruby in the Smoke, on the other hand, has a ridiculously engaging storyline, but what makes it enjoyable is the writing. It's well written--very well written. I quoted a bit out loud, and was struck by how the sentence held up when spoken. The entire book is almost like poetry. This is what I enjoyed so much about The Golden Compass. Pullman has the ability to use colorful, perfect words... I wonder what went wrong with The Amber Spyglass--maybe it was a bad editor? I don't know. Anyway, what I'm driving at is that the old rule holds: good writing and/or a good story are the two components that make a good book. You don't necessarily have to have both, but either way it has to balance out. The Amber Spyglass is the end of a good story, and there have certainly been amazing parts of the book, but overall, I don't think it holds together well because the story is not good enough to balance out the less-than-awesome writing. (I apologize if this changes toward the end--I haven't made it more than a little over halfway.)

The one thing I found slightly difficult about The Ruby in the Smoke is that each page is so full of information and flows so well that you only absorb about half of it and end up having to reread. On multiple occasions, I found my eyes several paragraphs ahead of my comprehension. It's a very fast paced book, and gripping, and you have to be careful not to miss anything important. Typical Victorian adventure story, with all the best components: Opium, a missing ruby, urchins and Chinamen. Startlingly, about halfway through I realized that it reminded me a great deal of Howl's Moving Castle; if you read them both, you'd understand.

Just wanted to rant; sorry about any lack of language skills, I've been reading all day and my brain's a little out of it. Now I need the next book.