The Golden Compass Graphic Novel, Volume 1 (His Dark Materials) - Softcover

PHILIP PULLMAN is one of the most acclaimed writers working today. He is best known for the His Dark Materials trilogy (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, The Amber Spyglass), which has been named one of the top 100 novels of all time by Newsweek and one of the all-time greatest novels by Entertainment Weekly. He has also won many distinguished prizes, including the Carnegie Medal for The Golden Compass (and the reader-voted "Carnegie of Carnegies" for the best children's book of the past seventy years); the Whitbread (now Costa) Award for The Amber Spyglass; a Booker Prize long-list nomination (The Amber Spyglass); Parents' Choice Gold Awards (The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass); and the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, in honor of his body of work. In 2004, he was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire.
 
It has recently been announced that The Book of Dust, the much anticipated new book from Mr. Pullman, also set in the world of His Dark Materials, will be published as a major work in three parts, with the first part to arrive in October 2017.  
 
Philip Pullman is the author of many other much-lauded novels. Other volumes related to His Dark Materials: Lyra’s Oxford, Once Upon a Time in the North, and The Collectors. For younger readers: I Was a Rat!; Count Karlstein; Two Crafty Criminals; Spring-Heeled Jack, and The Scarecrow and His Servant. For older readers: the Sally Lockhart quartet: The Ruby in the Smoke, The Shadow in the North, The Tiger in the Well, and The Tin Princess; The White Mercedes; and The Broken Bridge.
 
Philip Pullman lives in Oxford, England. To learn more, please visit philip-pullman.com and hisdarkmaterials.com. Or follow him on Twitter at @PhilipPullman.
STÉPHANE MELCHIOR has worked as a screenwriter for both film and television. Recently, he turned his creative energies toward comics, penning both original stories and adaptations, including Raiju and Raiden with Loïc Sécheresse and an adaptation of The Great Gatsby with Benjamin Bachelier.
 
CLÉMENT OUBRERIE is the acclaimed illustrator of more than forty picture books and is a co-founder of the 3D animation studio Station OMD. His comics include the Aya of Yopougon series by Marguerite Abouet and Pablo by Julie Birmant. His illustrations for The Golden Compass won an award at the International Comics Festival in Angoulême, France.

Gr 6 Up—The first book of Pullman's acclaimed "His Dark Materials" series, The Golden Compass, appears in a well-told and well-drawn graphic format in this volume, to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the book's publication. The graphic novel adaptation divides the first book into three volumes, with this first volume following Lyra up until the time that she sails for the North with the gyptians. With Lyra, readers will overhear plots in Jordan College; suffer the loss of her friend, Roger; and receive the mysterious alethiometer. They will escape from Mrs. Coulter and join the gyptians in their camp in the fens, all the while hoping to reunite with her uncle, Lord Asriel, who has gone to the North. The artists' interpretation of the work pairs well with the story. The somewhat muted color scheme reinforces the Dickensian feel of the novels. The characters and their backdrops are drawn in a style reminiscent of a child's hand, albeit with a sophistication and level of detail not expected of a child. VERDICT Whether this is a reader's first experience with the tale or they are already familiar with the story, they should be delighted by this rendition.—Eric Norton, McMillan Memorial Library, Wisconsin Rapids, WI