It took me a while to get into the narrative. The characters were completely unfamiliar and Pullman did not employ any bit of exposition. Later I discovered that this book is not the first in the series. If I had enjoyed this book more I might feel compelled to pick up the first book. The narrative was over the top in ridiculousness as is typical for this kind of children's literature. Sometimes this works. Sometimes it does not. This book falls somewhere in the middle. It was hard to keep everything straight in the narrative especially since I never really became invested in the characters and the various exploits.