Lessons Learned from The Golden Compass
I'm going to say something controversial here: I didn't love The Golden Compass.
I really wanted to like it. It checked all the boxes. Spunky young heroine! Daemons! Talking armored bears! The creepy Oblation Board!
I finally abandoned it because I made a commitment to myself a few months ago that I'm not going to force myself to finish books I don't enjoy. Reading should be fun! Also, it was a library book and with several holds on it, they wouldn't let me renew it anymore. I still had 170 pages to go.
I plan to give it another try some day when I've had more sleep. I even picked up a used copy the other day and it's sitting on my shelf waiting for its second chance. In the meantime, I've moved on to a book that hooked me right away.
My experience with The Golden Compass did get me thinking, though. Pullman created such a clear and imaginative world for this series, and yet that wasn't enough to keep my interest. Why?
The first problem for me was that I had a hard time connecting with Lyra. I don't think it's because she's a child, because as an adult I've read many books with children as the main characters and that hasn't stopped me loving those stories. It was more that I wasn't really rooting for Lyra. It's not like I was rooting against her, but I didn't feel super invested. Something was missing for me there. I haven't really put my finger on what that is yet.
I also had problems with the golden compass itself, the alethiometer. It seemed too convenient, and Lyra's natural ability to use it confused me. I know she wasn't always clear on the meaning, and she was supposed to be destined to save the world or something, but it still felt too easy that she was given such a device in the first place. Maybe it will be explained more in the end, or maybe in my exhaustion I missed some important piece of information. I don't know.
All this got me thinking about my own work in progress, which is also a YA fantasy. If this thing ever gets published one day, will my future readers abandon it 60% of the way through because they don't like it as much as they hoped they would?
As I'm revising my first draft, I'm trying to keep in mind four things I learned. First, no matter how cool the world I build turns out to be, the world alone cannot carry the story. Second, I need to make sure my characters are real, relatable people so my readers will care about what happens to them. Third, I need to be careful to avoid the dreaded deus ex machina. When a story's problems get wrapped up in a neat little package that doesn't really seem to fit, readers are left feeling duped and disappointed.
Finally, not everyone is going to like what I write, regardless of how good or bad it turns out to be. And that is okay. People will like what they like. If I can be happy with the work I have done and feel proud of it, that should be enough.
But I do hope that it's good. And that someone other than me will like my story. I'm only human.
So tell me: Am I alone in my feelings about The Golden Compass? Does anyone else have a book that everyone else seemed to love, but you just feel "meh" about it?