I know it's not strictly adult but what happens at the end of The Amber Spyglass/

[dalek]

It's not that long since I read it but I cannot for the life of me remember what happened right at the end. I remember that they have to close all the openings and Lyra talks about sitting on a bench and remembering each other - what happens after that?

TIA

x

I think that they have to go back to their own worlds because they have closed all the openings, so they can no longer visit each other. But they still 'meet' at the bench in Oxford, and can sense each other.

I distinctly remember crying, so it must have been something sad!!!

Could look it up in the book if you like? (It is the last one, isn't it?)

Thanks Penona - I've given my copies to a friend's daughter to borrow

bump - think Penona may have forgotten

Hello, sorry, misread your email. Have got the book now.

Will try and precis as best I can!

Every time the knife is used to open between worlds, a spectre is created. The spectre feeds off people's daemons and dust. So the spectres must be destroyed, and the knife no longer used, and the openings closed.

Lyra and Will have to go back to their own worlds, because neither can survive in the other one's world and they need to close up all the openings between the worlds. They close the final one and then Will has to destroy the knife that makes the openings so no more can be made.
Lyra goes back to Jordan college, Will goes back to his life, and both agree to 'meet' every Midsummer day at the botanic garden, although of course they will never see each other again.

Oh tis so sad and hopeless

I always cry my eyes out at the end . Though I love the last couple of lines in the book about how they have to create heaven each day and wherever they are!

Oh oh oh oh oh no fair I'm getting all weepy now. Such a wonderful book, I always forget that they are so young. I love Lyra's at the end, the way her determination has become sort of refined a bit and so much more mature in her attitude towards going to school etc.

I hate the end of the Amber Spyglass. They're in love? Unnecessary.

trillian, you hard-hearted woman

Am I way off beam or did they shag shortly before the end of the book? I did read it some time ago.

Oh I love the ending. I agree it's a bit that 12/13 year olds can be so completely in love but I read it when I was quite young so that escaped me at the time. I do think PP could have at least made them a year or two older.

There is great discussion on that all over the internet Georgimama I don't think they did. But some people say it's implied in the text.

Really? Was it supposed to be unclear? I do now have a very clear recollection of reading that they had a shag (naturally Philip Pullman phrased it a little bit better than that).

Right, am going to have to try to find relevant passage somewhere....

where can we find this discussion please?
do I just google Lyra shags Will?

Right, this is a bit of the said passage:

"..he moved his hand from Lyra's wrist and stroke the red-gold fur of her Dæmon.
Lyra gasped. But her surprise was mixed with a pleasure so like the joy that flooded through her when she had put the fruit to his lips that she couldn't protest, because she was breathless. With a racing heart she responded in the same way: she put her hand on the silky warmth of Will's Dæmon, and as her finders tightened in the fur she knew that Will was feeling exactly what she was."

There was more but I can't find it.

Have found some pious sites full of Americans protesting that 13 year olds don't have sexual urges so of course they didn't.

Okaaayyy.....

Pretty much what I googled.

I have the book here, there are a few bits

• she offers him a crunchy red apple
• Mary describes them as 'no-longer-children'
• the they touch each others daemons and they take on a permanent form and "wondering whether any lovers before them had made this discovery, they lay together as the earth turns....."

Sounds like a shag to me....

That's the bit that made me think it was an allegory for sex. The "wondering whether any lovers before them had made this discovery".

Perhaps that's just because I had an unusually lovely experience of losing my virginity and felt exactly like that.

I love the end of this book - makes me cry every time too.
Yes, imo, they have a shag, then have to be apart for ever

And worth bearing in mind that Lyra is probably about the same age as Shakespeare's Juliet... and no-one seems to complain about her being too young. Even though Romeo is probably early 20s (cradle snatcher )

they have gone through a lot, too, saving universes and so on, would make you more grown up, wouldn't it?

Thank you so much ladies - good old mumsnet

LOL at Georgiemama looking for the appropriate passage

Yeah they shagged.

That is true. I always thought they didn't actually have full on sex but that the daemon-touching was sexual, in a kind of innocent romantic way.

The daemon-touching, that sounds so wrong