http://btt2.wordpress.com/2010/07/01/disappointment/
Name a book or author that you truly wanted to love but left you disappointed. (And, of course, explain why.)
Oh, this is a challenging question. The first answer that comes to mind for me is the His Dark Materials series by Philip Pullman. I already gave my reasons in a book review six months ago. Oddly enough, I was reminded of it just yesterday (i.e. before I read this question) because of a trailer for The Golden Compass movie on TV. I read the books because over the years, I have found some other fantasy worlds, like Lord of the Rings (J.R.R. Tolkien), Narnia (C.S. Lewis) and Harry Potter (J.K. Rowling) to challenge me, encourage and inspire me. But Pullman's books pretty much just managed to depress me. After the second book I doubted I'd ever get round to reading the last one. Then I saw the film based on the first book, and found that I liked that better. Analyzing, my conclusion is that the film focuses on the visual images, tones down the overt criticism of Church/ Christianity in the books and leaves more things open to interpretation. I have difficulties with Pullman's approach in the books, not just because he takes this critical view of the church, but also because in my opinion he fails to make full use of fantasy as medium. It's like he can't even be bothered to make up his own images or parallells of some things. After finishing the last book, I was still left with that impression. Neither the background worlds nor the characters convince me; and I never get properly drawn into the story. I only finished it because I wanted to try to understand what other people saw in it.
