It's not so much that the book is bad, per se, though I do think it becomes too dark for the age group I initially thought it was written for. they seem to make a reappearance in the final book of the series, but why spend so much time on their culture in the first book if you aren't going to include them in the second? (I know that the panserbjörne's culture is basically that of any warrior society, but they're still armored polar bears and the ten year old in me think that's awesome) I may have been more willing to swallow his philosophy, such as it is, if there hadn't been a complete lack of the elements I liked in The Golden Compass: there were no Gyptians, there were no panserbjörne. Once you try to toss in angels and consciousness and so on (which is insulting in a children's book, as he's claiming that children are entirely self involved until puberty), though, it seems contrived and silly. Adapting it to fit with concepts of physics in our world works because it uses something we only know a little about. I love plots that put a spin on traditional religion ( Waiting for the Galactic Bus, for example), but it seems like Pullman came up with a story involving a culture's religion and then decided to make it fit with the Judeo-Christian framework no matter how hard he had to push. I'm an agnostic, so these complaints don't come from someone insulted by the material, they come from someone unhappy by their handling. Herein lies my main concern with the series as a whole: it's not (excuse the pun) subtle. Some of the main characters have decided to wage war on 'The Authority.' I had heard before I started the series that they were 'about killing God.' This seemed highly unlikely, and was probably a knee-jerk reaction from people who heard it from other people who read a synopsis of the book, etc. Some of these elements are expanded upon in The Amber Spyglass, which I'm currently reading, so forgive me if they don't all apply. It seems like Philip Pullman wanted to reel us in with fantasy before he could preach at us. The Subtle Knife, however decides that most of this is insignificant and takes place almost entirely in different universes. In The Golden Compass, we were treated to a rich alternate universe that had elements that were similar to our own, like some of the geopolitical structure, and elements that were entirely fantastical, like armored polar bears and witches.

Instead of the good stuff, in The Subtle Knife I feel as though we've had a bait and switch pulled on us.

Instead, the focus can be on 'the good stuff': elaborating on the story, teasing us more, giving action, chopping off Luke's hand and so on. The author doesn't have to introduce the universe or the characters, as they did in the first installment, but they don't need to worry about wrapping up all the plot points either.

The second entry in a trilogy is often, in my opinion, the best.

His dark materials audiobook