I’m now nearing the conclusion of Northen Lights and, you know, I quite take back what I previously said about my having seen the movie in advance having a diminishing effect upon the novel’s ability to completely enthral me. Those chapters set in the Bolvangar labs were utterly magnetic, I honestly couldn’t put the book aside until that stage of the story had reached completion. Unsettling stuff, but really fascinating.
The mistakes made by the big-screen adaptation are also becoming a bit more transparent, notably their decision to re-arrange the structure of the story so as to adhere to a more crowd-pleasing formula, with a big dramatic LOTR-style battle forming the climax...which is all well and good, only it left the latter half feeling strangely disjointed. I can vouch that the transition from one plot point to another is much more skillfully done within the novel and that there's more of a cumulative effect. Oh, and Sarafina Pekkala is here much more of a justified character (all the same, I
dare you to try saying that name with a straight face...it can't be done
)
I have a few more chapters left to read, and then onto "The Subtle Knife" we go.
