Another astounding book by Philip Pullman. His way of capturing his audience is extraordinary. The book, as his others, is quite complicated - but without knowing it, you follow everything. This book carries on from the trilogy starting with,'The Ruby in the Smoke' It stars a young defiant lady called Sally Lockhart who, in the last book, joined up with Frederick Garland, a good natured photographer. He stars in this book along with a number of familiar characters from the first book.In their spare time, they are detectives - this sounds very tacky and unoriginal but in this story it is extremely realistic. The story is set in London in the late 1800s. It is excellent and leaves you in tears at places. I highly reccomend it to any children aged between 12-15.