How I met Lyra, Will and the others

[Donny]

Hello, there you can tell how you meet them! How do you find the book? Me it was in my first years as schoolgirl. We should talk about one book in my French lessons. Someone told about HDM but when I saw the book, I said it must be a very boring book and I didn’t listen her presentation. One year later a friend of mine told me about the book he said it is great book. I tried to read the book but I didn’t finish. But I read an other book of P.P I loved it was Sally Lockart. Anyways last summer, when I was in the library a women said you should read the book. It is very good book. I saw the trailer of the film when I was in the cinema with my two little brothers. So I said to my sister the day of my seventh’ birthday. I want the three HDM’s book. I wanted to read the book, have something different than Harry Potter and discover the book.

And read before go to see the movie. I took a really pleasure with the book. The pages turned alone. I loved the great imagination of Pullman .I love P.P writing.I was touched by the book and no by HP. It was different than HP. The trilogy is awesome even a took so long to read the book. I am sad bought the book. I think the book should have success Harry Potter. And a big thank to Philip Pullman. He wrote a very amazing universe

[Adamoun]

A family-friend of my recommended it. So I went to the library and borrowet the GC.
I read the whole series and then... forgot it. Today I cannot believe how stupid I was.

[TowerDragon]

I got introduced to the trilogy this August after reading the Last Harry Potter book. I was Disappointed ( I guess I was expecting to much) with the way the book ended that I was searching the fan forums for other books to read and someone recommended HDM series I read them and I have not regretted it ever since. Hard to believe that I was so hooked on to Harry Potter for ten years. I was so oblivious to these great books.

[Into-Dust]

I can't remember. I think I might have gotten NL for birthday/christmas...

[Donny]

yeah harry potter is great TowerDragon but i don't love the end

[intrinsical]

Ooh well I personally loved the ending of Harry Potter, but on to my story...

Alright, so a bunch of kids in my 4th grade class read the books, but I honestly didn't think they looked that good, so I didnt read them.
In 6th grade I moved to America, and did a summer camp, where everyone recommended HDM to me, so I read the series!!!
I loved it.
I got so obsessed
too bad I didn't read it earlier, but then again I did start reading it at Lyra's age...

[CMR]

No idea. I remember hearing that a friend was reading The Subtle Knife years and years ago, when i was still in primary school, but it sounded like an adult book so i didn't give it another moments thought. But somehow i managed to aquire all three without noticing...

[inchvbeam]

Im from Singapore, & there's a newspaper about the movie <<Golden>> where they introduced this HDM. I nv look back after buying it!

[grantpj]

I have to admit that I was of the opinion that authors like Alan Garner and Ursula K Le Guin would never be bettered in this genre. HP never appealed to me, and I avoided the books and films like the plague! Friends of mine raved about HP, but this was often because they had missed out on any decent fantasy literature in their youth and had nothing to judge JKR's quality by.

Two years ago I was given some book tokens for Christmas, and I asked the bookshop salesgirl for a recommendation. This was how I got to know HDM. After seeing the GC film last week I joined this forum.

By the way, Donny. Your English is excellent! Did you say you got the books this year for your <u><b>seventh</b></u> birthday?!!

[lifegetsyoudown]

A couple of years ago a friend of mine recommended the books. (Just like he did with the inheritance trilogy) I was looking in stores over here (The Netherlands) and I just couldn't find the books! Finally in like april or something I found the books in a bookstore nearby my hometown and I just bought them all three without thinking it over. Read them, and loved them

[SnoWolFire]

I heard of it in another forum, and when I went to a bookstore, I saw it, and since I had nothing to read, I bought it, and I don't regeret

(Just like he did with the inheritance trilogy)

Correction: Inheritance Cycle. There will be 4 books.

[violet93]

I first got The Golden Compass at a used book sale about a year and a half ago. I don't actually remember picking it up, but the books were so cheap I just threw anything that looked interesting into a bag and it ended up in there with about a dozen others. I didn't get around to reading it for a month or two, read a few chapters, and to be honest I lost interest in it for a while (mainly because I have issues with small print, not because it wasn't interesting enough).

Then a few months later, just after I'd gotten a different copy, my english class ended up reading it. By the time I finally finished it I was hooked, got the other two, read up to about a third of the way through The Amber Spyglass, and then.... lost it. So I forgot about the series, again, up until this past summer when TAS turned up. When that happened I just decided to read all of the books again, and for whatever reason I absolutely loved them.

I have no idea why they were so much better the second time around (they were extremely good the first time I read them, don't get me wrong, I just wasn't as crazy about them as I am now), but there you go.

[serafinarocks]

oomg donny you are seven? you write so well !!!!!!!!! do you actually understand everything in the book ? my brither could never understand and he is 8 !!!!!! well then again. bravo!!! lol

[daemon_hadevir]

A friend of mine from college told me about the books.
We talk a lot of the books we read, and one day (almost three years ago), she tells me: "I have a great trilogy about..." and starts talking about it, Dæmon, parallel universes, and I was confused, but I read them and got depressed, and I took way too long to give the books back to her.
the next thing I did was buy them for myself, and tell about them to other friends.
they're reading them and loving them, which is GREAT!

[JoeSchmo]

Since around four years ago, everyone had been telling me to read it, but I never read it because it looked like HP . When the movie was announced and I saw the omnibus @ the bookstore I was like WTH and got it.
To this day, Ive reread it 3 times.

[lovelyra]

First I saw the trailer at the movies...
Then I had a conversation with a friend of mine about books, and he mentioned it...
I didn't plan to read it, but a day when I was at the book store(looking for other books) , I saw TGC and decided to buy it.
Glad i did!! I finished the book the day before I saw the movie, and bought TSK the next day.
And finished TAS a couple of days ago.
(I have just ordered Lyra's Oxford, so I'll be able to read it a few days.)

[daemon_hadevir]

that's cool, I was hoping the movie and the publicity would let more people find this amazing story, I'm glad that's happening

[Adamoun]

I too wished that the movie would do good for the books. But here in Joensuu it didn't happen, I'm afraid.

[BabyCarrot]

I saw the trailer. Thought it was some Narnia ripoff.
Read news about Christian Organisation's objection to the movie and the book, which piqued my interest. (e.g. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjb4ockFXkM )
Always wanted to get into Fantasy books so I started with that.

[Paxyn]

My mother gave the book to me the same year it came out, 1995. I was 7 years old and I loved it ever since.

[pelicanlake71]

I was in Oxford in September 2006, and our tour guide kept having to make detours around this movie crew that was filming there. It was called "The Golden Compass" and all we knew was that Nicole Kidman was in it.

When the movie came out I mentioned it to my friend who is an avid reader, and she said I HAD to read the books. I picked them up and could not put them down. I did see the movie (it was filmed when we were there, after all) but it doesn't compare to the books, which may be my favorite trilogy of all time.

[Boydesy]

My girlfriend basically forced me to read them. I had never even heard of the books or Philip Pullman up until then. I didn't read them until I was 27 which might seem old but keep in mind that when TGC/NL was published in 1995, I was already 15 years old and too busy playing video games and worried about begging for dates to high school dances, to worry about reading something that I wasn't forced to read for a class. By the time TAS was published I was 21, too swamped in college courses and my new found ability to purchase beer to read for pleasure. Finally after all that I entered a relationship with a great woman who was an avid reader, who told me point blank that I had to read these novels. I started reading TGC right before I saw the first trailer for the film. I powered through the TSK and TAS well before film was released. I was completely blown away by the intricasies and layers of meaning in Pullman's work that HDM quickly became one of my favorite all time works of fiction. While my relationship whit my girlfriend has ended, my love of these books probably never will. And I FINALLY have my own copy!

[daemon_hadevir]

I was in Oxford in September 2006, and our tour guide kept having to make detours around this movie crew that was filming there. It was called "The Golden Compass" and all we knew was that Nicole Kidman was in it.

When the movie came out I mentioned it to my friend who is an avid reader, and she said I HAD to read the books. I picked them up and could not put them down. I did see the movie (it was filmed when we were there, after all) but it doesn't compare to the books, which may be my favorite trilogy of all time.

That's soooo lucky! *envy*

[pelicanlake71]

I was in Oxford in September 2006, and our tour guide kept having to make detours around this movie crew that was filming there. It was called "The Golden Compass" and all we knew was that Nicole Kidman was in it.

When the movie came out I mentioned it to my friend who is an avid reader, and she said I HAD to read the books. I picked them up and could not put them down. I did see the movie (it was filmed when we were there, after all) but it doesn't compare to the books, which may be my favorite trilogy of all time.

That's soooo lucky! *envy*

I was very lucky, if you believe in luck, although sadly I didn't know it at the time! I walked right by the bench but didn't know it as I hadn't read the books yet. I will return to England this coming autumn and I hope to convince my husband to return to Oxford at least for the day.

For those of you at all interested in plants, the Botanic Garden is truly a wonderful place. Not large, not flashy, but interesting. The fact that various literature contains scenes from the garden just makes it all the more special.

[daemon_hadevir]

yes, I saw pisctures of it, and as a biology student that interests me.
I know if someday I get the chance to visit UK, I'll find a way to visit Oxford and, of course, the bench!