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As the novel opens, Will's enemies will do anything for information about his missing father, a soldier and Arctic explorer who has been very much airbrushed from the official picture. Now Will must get his mother into safe seclusion and make his way toward Oxford, which may hold the key to John Parry's disappearance. But en route and on the lam from both the police and his family's tormentors, he comes upon a cat with more than a mouse on her mind: "She reached out a paw to pat something in the air in front of her, something quite invisible to Will." What seems to him a patch of everyday Oxford conceals far more: "The cat stepped forward and vanished." Will, too, scrambles through and into another oddly deserted landscape--one in which children rule and adults (and felines) are very much at risk. Here in this deathly silent city by the sea, he will soon have a dustup with a fierce, flinty little girl: "Her expression was a mixture of the very young--when she first tasted the cola--and a kind of deep, sad wariness." Soon Will and Lyra (and, of course, her dæmon, Pantalaimon) uneasily embark on a great adventure and head into greater tragedy. (Amazon.com)A worthy second enstallment. I enjoyed it as much as the first. Will is a great addition. He is so strong and brave and his love for his mother is inspiring. His magic artifact is terrible and amazing all at once. The different worlds are described wonderfully.
This second novel does go a bit more into the anti-religous aspect of things and sure there's some sacreligous things mentioned, but once again if you take it for what it is (a fantasy novel) then there's no reason to take offense. So again I enjoyed the book, but as with the first, I do not find it a childrens story at all. It is full of things that young children wouldn't understand and includes things such as violence, death, and sex. Not terribly detailed, but enough that I wonder how anyone would ever think this was a story for children.
So a good story for adults, but would need severe editing to be a children's story.
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The overlays say:
Momma's Boy
Daddy's Boy
Momma's Girl
Daddy's Girl
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OATHS SWORN . . . loyalties tested . . . forces collide.Following the colossal battle against the Empire’s warriors on the Burning Plains, Eragon and his dragon, Saphira, have narrowly escaped with their lives. Still there is more at hand for the Rider and his dragon, as Eragon finds himself bound by a tangle of promises he may not be able to keep.First is Eragon’s oath to his cousin Roran: to help rescue Roran’s beloved, Katrina, from King Galbatorix’s clutches. But Eragon owes his loyalty to others, too. The Varden are in desperate need of his talents and strength—as are the elves and dwarves. When unrest claims the rebels and danger strikes from every corner, Eragon must make choices— choices that take him across the Empire and beyond, choices that may lead to unimagined sacrifice.Eragon is the greatest hope to rid the land of tyranny. Can this once-simple farm boy unite the rebel forces and defeat the king? (amazon.com)I was not so impressed with this installment of the series. The politics made it long and often uneventful. There was lacking a general plot. Many subplots but aside from the series objective of kill the king, there was no sustaining plot thgough this book. As often happens when a series is lengthened to this extent there are more characters with more foreign names than we can keep track of. The climax felt rather anticlamatical to me.
Having said this, I still am excited for the last book to come out. I hope the final battle will make up for the "filler" book.
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Aren't they great! She must know me so well. Fairies and my men! My favorite things! I'm sad cause I can't get them to work as sig tags at CafeMom, but I'll use them elsewhere. Bonus points to my secret sister cause I never got around to sending pictures for her to use. Did that stop her? NO! She took these pictures of my handsome men off another LO I've done. How clever is that? I love you secret sister! You rock!
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