Books for Xmas: Older children and teenagers

By NICK SMITH

Far more worthy of the bonfire than Harry Potter, a million times more sinister ... truly the stuff of nightmares," says the Catholic Herald. Fans of author Philip Pullman's heretical trilogy His Dark Materials (Scholastic), would agree - it is better than Harry Potter.

It is a dark, astonishingly inventive piece of Celtic fiction, comparable to the classics in the genre: Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, Susan Cooper's Dark is Rising quintet, Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea saga and the C.S. Lewis Narnia series. It's that good.

In the first two instalments, Northern Lights and The Subtle Knife (both $15.95), readers are introduced to the two main characters, Lyra and Will - children from parallel worlds. Both worlds share a common enemy, the Church, which is the source of all evil and is intent on suppressing or destroying all that is good and noble. Will and Lyra's mission is to end the tyrannical despotism of The Authority (God). The third book, The Amber Spyglass ($34.95), picks up the tale as the two protagonists prepare for the ultimate assault on Heaven in an effort to literally kill God. No wonder Christians take a dim view of His Dark Materials.

Essentially, it is a retelling of the Fall, with Lyra cast as Eve. It is also the Lucifer myth, told from the horned one's perspective.

Pullman's language is simple and effective, but it is his sympathetic, brilliant characterisation and complex plotting that lift His Dark Materials out of the realm of children's fiction. The cast includes the beautiful and sinister Mrs Marisa Coulter, a Church emissary so vicious and cruel that she makes Fred West appear well adjusted; the witch queen Serafina Pekkala; a host of Spectres, ephemeral creatures that literally suck the soul out of adults, leaving the victims as zombies; Iorek Byrnison, the talking armoured polar bear, a fully fleshed-out character who is as heroic and admirable as Tolkein's Aragorn

Pullman does not paint everything in stark black and white. His characters are refreshingly complex: Lyra betrays a childhood friend; her father, Lord Asriel, who is leading the assault on Heaven, is cruel and bloodthirsty; the rebel Angels think nothing of sacrificing "good" humans if it will further their revenge against God.

Major characters are killed off with distressing regularity and there are no happy endings, adding pathos and realism to a tale that is deadly serious.

In interviews, Pullman comes across as serious to the point of obsession. He vilifies the Church for its many "sins," positively froths at the mouth when it comes to Narnia, which he regards as a thinly disguised biblical tract, quotes liberally from Blake, Milton and Coleridge, and describes his trilogy as stark realism. He says that humanity needs a republic of heaven, not a kingdom, and that he would be "happy to be denounced from pulpits across the land."

It would be sinful to reveal what happens to God in Pullman's final volume.

This is brave and dangerous writing, a staggering work of imagination that is destined to become a classic.

24 Hours, Margaret Mahy (HarperCollins $16.95)

Margaret Mahy's teenage thriller is a white-knuckle, foot-to-the-floor descent into madness, and disturbing despite its conventional premise. Ellis Hudson - a 17-year-old slab of hormones - has his life ahead of him when he meets the mysterious sisters Ursa, Leona and Fox at the Land-of-Smiles motel.

Life is never the same again, unravelling from awful to nightmarish. Mahy gets the tone just right, spooking the reader with a sinister undercurrent from the opening chapter. There's also humour: "Of course, none of us here are normal," warns Pandora, a beautician who works at the Kurl-Up & Dye.

Ellis is a deliciously decent chap, an average Everyteen with extra sensitivity. The sisters are beautiful, dangerous and, in the case of Fox, weird.

Maui - the legend of the demi-god Maui-Tikitiki-a-Taranga by Hana Hiraina Erlbeck (Reed $14.95)

At the heart of every legend is a good tale. Erlbeck invests the familiar characters with such a zest for life that heroic figures such as Maui leap off the page. In Erlbeck's hands, Maui possesses that overblown sense of self-importance essential to any legend.

Demi-gods like Maui are essentially children - vicious, spiteful, inventive and creative. Erlbeck does a superb job fashioning real people out of the crude clay of myth.

Marsden on Marsden by John Marsden (MacMillan $18.95)

John Marsden is beginning to give Enid Blyton a run for her money. The Australian author of what is mostly excellent fiction is prolific, but his latest offering smacks of the factory line. In what feels like his trillionth release, Marsden writes about himself. His Tomorrow series was admirable, and Marsden on Marsden is ideal for the obsessive teenage celebrity stalker.

Old Magic by Marianne Curley (Bloomsbury $18.95)

Australian Marianne Curley's Old Magic is a teenage soap opera masquerading as a thriller, with smatterings of new-age magic. It's worse than an episode of Home and Away and you can hear the clunking of the author's keyboard as she desperately tries to muster a feeling of menace.

Apparently, this tale is a remarkable journey in a battle to undo the past and reshape the future. Take their word for it, just don't read it.

The Wave Rider by Graeme Lay (Penguin $15.95)

Justine is stuck in the small seaside town of Kaimara wondering when her real life will begin, when who surfs into town but Carl - spiky blonde hair, tan, deep blue eyes. Watch out Justine, he's just behind you. Essentially a cautionary tale - booze, boys, pregnancy scares - but much better than an episode of Home and Away.