Chapter 13

Lyra shudders at the fact that Tony doesn't have a daemon anymore since it was separated from him by the Gobblers. Side note: I'm a bit confused about whether Tony is an actual person or a ghost for a while later they give him a proper funeral which could mean both ways. And also, the people in the town call him a ghost that terrifies them but apparently he was eating some fish when Lyra found him. It's just really weird and I'm totally confused by it. Anyway, Iorek takes Tony and her back to the ship where all of the crew members get scared and have just as much pity for him as Lyra did. Tony keeps on asking where his Ratter is and it seems as though "ratter" is actually what he nicknamed his Daemon. I'm just super confused, while on the trip back to the gyptian ship Lyra is "carrying" the tiny kid in her arms but when they give him a proper burial she says she will remember him (let me know what you think about this). 

Chapter 14

While everyone on the ship is resting a volley of arrows starts attacking them from all different angles. Lyra and the other crew members don't know where because it was super dark outside but eventually most of the folks were killed. Lyra and her daemon pretended to be dead or unconscious but were later found the next day. She was taken to a facility but doesn't know the location or name of the place. A group of people inspect her and Lyra decides to make up a random named called, "Lizzie". And that's how the staff that worked at the facility she was mysteriously taken to call her. Afterwards, "Lizzie" took a shower and was given all her items back (golden compass since they don't know what it actually is) and is put into a room filled with a bunch of other girls. The boys seemed to be placed in a whole different room. Then the girls mentioned Ms Coulter and apparently, she came by every now and then to see the kid who gets taken away and never comes back. That's when Lyra knew she was in the Gobbler's facility.

Now it's time to talk about what I did yesterday. My father took my sister and me outside to Whole Foods but that wasn't his first choice. Instead, he planned on going to a pancake restaurant but unfortunately, he couldn't find out where exactly it was. The Whole Foods only had the breakfast option but I still fairly enjoyed it because of eggs and toasts. They tasted way better than I thought they would. Now after the Whole Foods, my father looked on Facebook and saw a post made by another Tibetan person and how his family decided to celebrate the birthday of the Dalai Lama by giving them water. So my dad thought that it would be cool to do the same thing. Now I think we bought almost all of the water that was on the shelves at Whole Foods and I can bet you that cost a lot of money! Anyway, we headed towards Journal Square and started handing people the free water and most of them thanked us.

The Golden Compass

Chapter 1

Lyra (the protagonist) is a little girl that is raised in a rich "college". Apparently, in this book, people have spirit animals called, "Daemons". These are creatures that have the ability to change in different species of animals while they are still young, but once their human partner is old enough they need to take on one form and stay that way. Anyway, right now Lyra and her Daemon are creeping through the hallways of the "college" (very rich and grand building" trying to find the retiring room. She knew that her uncle "Lord Asriel" would be meeting with the Master of the College in a specific room today for "political reasons". This room is called the retiring room and no women or lower class men are allowed inside, however, Lyra doesn't care and looks around before hiding under the table when someone enters the room. It was the master and his butler, the master ordered a special type of wine that he knew Lord Asriel liked and the butler brought it in. Then, he asked the butler to leave and come back later. When the master was all alone Lyra saw him put some type of white powder inside of the wine that Lord Asriel was supposed to drink.

Chapter 2f

Since Lord Asriel was probably one of the most important officials out there and also her uncle Lyra knew she had to do something. But after the Master left she ran into the wardrobe with her Daemon and told herself she was going to stay and somehow stop her uncle from drinking that poisonous wine (she assumed it was poisonous because if it wasn't then why did he tell the butler to leave?). After about 5 minutes of rustling inside of the closet, Lord Asriel appeared inside of the retiring room. It seemed like he missed the dinner that all of the higher officials were having and so he decided to wait for them. The butler came to greet her uncle and then left after fixing the lamp that was in the room. Lyra saw that her uncle was looking at the glass of wine and started to walk towards it when she burst out of the closet and yelled for him to stop. He immediately turned around and got very mad saying "What the hell are you doing!". Lyra explained how the drink as poisonous and he thanked her greatly.

Chapter 3

Eventually, all of the officials gathered in the room and the Master seemed to be surprised that he wasn't dead. He was whispering with the Librarian and they had a very good friendship and knew about the plan. Now obviously the librarian didn't want Lord Asriel to die but couldn't exactly say that to the Master since he could still possibly be fired. Lyra's uncle asked her to keep track of what the Master was saying since she was still hiding inside of the wardrobe. And now it was time for Lord Asriel to explain why he was here. The old man said that he wanted to show this group of people who work at the college a little presentation filled with images. There used to be a man named Grumman and he did an expedition to the far North where he saw the Northern Lights and actually had "Dust" on his hand! I still don't know much about it seems to be really special and old to them. Like an artifact. And this Grumman man was killed by a group of people called, "Tarders" that decapitated him. The folks in the room were amazed by this and were curious to know more. When everyone left Lyra got out of the wardrobe and reluctantly went back to her bedroom by her uncle.

Chapter 4

The master gave Lyra a device called the Alethiometer. This device is actually a compass but the Master didn't explain how it worked so Lyra didn't know what to do with it. She seemed very surprised about it. The night before she was at a dinner party with 3 very important women who were supposed scholars at the college. One of them was named, " Ms Coulter" and her job was to send kids who were willing, to go to the North. However, Lyra and the people who she works for don't know that in reality she actually tricks them into going with her in exchange for a food and other luxuries. The master told Lyra that is was time to go and learn more stuff from places other than the college and let Ms Coulter be the one to help Lyra learn about the Solar system and the geography of the North. The master gave Lyra this compass but warned her to never show it to Ms Coulter, and then he left.

Chapter 5

Ms Coulter took Lyra everywhere in London while teaching her stuff like how to be a lady and educational topics as well. Lyra loved her life of care and luxury at first but as the days went by she started to feel as though she was Ms Coulter's pet. And was always curious as to why the Master didn't want the lady to know about the compass. Apparently, it is an extremely rare item that has only been made 6 times. One day, Ms Coulter decided to have a cocktail party but as she was telling Lyra to take off her shoulder bag Lyra refused, saying it was very dear to her, but in reality, the compass was inside of it. Ms Coulter's daemon (a gold monkey) grabbed Lyra's daemon and almost killed it but Lyra begged for it to stop so Ms. Coulter ordered her to take off the bag and kiss her on the cheek. Lyra knew that she had to escape and did exactly that while the party was still taking place.

Chapter 6 

Lyra started running really far away from the cocktail party and eventually made it across the river where she a saw a coffee shop. She had a lot of money since Ms Coulter wasn't afraid to give her some and got a cup of coffee and a ham sandwich. Thankfully, there was a man in a top hat that was near her and said he'd pay for her lunch. Lyra had no problem with that since she'd need to save up her money and she knew that if this guy was a kidnapper she could easily outrun him so she said thank you. As they sat down the man in the top hat asked what her name was and why she was out in the night alone. Lyra answered saying that her name was Alice and that he should mind her own business. Later on, she told him her father was a murderer and the guy started glancing around which gave her time to escape. That was when she met a group of men who are actually related to the kids that she used to play with back near the college. And they helped her continue to escape.

Chapter 7

So from this point in the story, Lyra stays with the men who help her escape and finds out that they are actually gyptians. Now in this book, "gyptians" are basically treated like how blacks were back in the old days so they treated as the "lesser" being. Anyway, along with the group of men, there was also a woman who Lyra called, "Mama Costa". Since the gyptians are known for being on the water and using ships instead of walking on the land like everyone else they have meetings by connecting their ships in circles and listening to John Fa (leader of the Gyptians) in the middle. The meetings are apparently called the "Ropings" for the Gyptians and when Lyra came they decided to have one. It was going to be because of all the kids being kidnapped and taken to a town in the North without the permission of the parents. So John Fa decided that all the head of the 6 families would gather up men to fight and also provide a decent sum of gold to pay the expense of this journey. 

Chapter 8

But Lyra stayed behind and was learning about her backstory. Apparently, Lord Asriel wasn't actually her uncle. In addition, Ms Coulter and Lord Asriel are actually her parents though she found it hard to believe at first. According to Lord Fa, he has had spies in Oxford college (where Lyra grew up) and knows almost everything about her. It seems that the story where Lyra's parents both died in an airship incident was a lie. Lyra is now very confused and amazed at the same time. The pastry chef that worked in the kitchen at Oxford college was actually half Gyptian so he was indeed another spy but was always kind. Now let me make sure you hear this right, just because they're spies doesn't mean they are bad people. Because the pastry chef certainly made the best food for Lyra and treated her kindly. 

Chapter 9

After this talk with Lord Fa about Lyra's childhood she also wanted to talk about the item that the Master gave to her before she left to join Ms Coulter which turned out to be the biggest mistake of her life. This compass is an ancient device that it also super rare and hard to use. You would need to learn more than 1000 different meanings for all of the symbols on the compass and also be calm enough to make the three-pointed handles move. Either way, Lyra has started working diligently to make the handles move and decided that one day she could control it. Anyway, there was a second Roping and in this meeting, all of the leaders or heads of the families gathered enough gold and troops that in total it resulted in about 100 men willing to fight. Tony, who was one of the men that helped Lyra escape) also volunteered to fight. Lyra was welcomed to come since she had the compass and was the daughter of Lord Asriel but was warned to not cause any trouble.

Part 2

Chapter 10

And now Lyra's journey to the North has begun. While on the ship with Lord Fa, Farder Coram explained what he was going to do once he reached the town that they were headed for. He knew that there was a consul there for witches and had apparently saved the life of one of these witches long ago. Now, it seems as though that particular witch has become a sort of clan leader and all Farder Coram needs to do is contact her through the consul. The consul was a man named, "Dr, Lanselius" and the only witch part of him was his eyes. His daemon was a green serpent and it matched the color of his eyes. Anyway, the man was intrigued by how Lyra could use the golden compass given to her by the Master and asked for a demonstration. After he was satisfied he gave Farder Coram all the information he needed and promised to inform the witch whose name was "Serafina".

Chapter 11

Before they left Farder Coram explained to him the reason they were even in the North in the first place and Dr, Lanselius said that they could hire a bear to help them fight the gobblers. Farder Coram didn't believe him at first since he thought that all the bears were on the side of the gobblers or at least paid to help them, but there was one outcast that didn't agree with the gobblers and coincidently lived very close by (in the town). Iorek was the name of the bear and he was apparently tricked to work in this since one day he got drunk while drinking beer and the townsfolk stole his armour. Now, bears don't have Daemons but their armour (which is made from the "sky") seems to hold a very strong meaning for them. Probably just as strong as a daemon. The bear said that he would fight with them in exchange for Farder Coram and Lyra to find his armour and they agreed.

Chapter 12

Now Lord Fa got some information on this guy from the townspeople and they said that the bear was an indentured servant. But Lyra knew the truth because she heard the bear's story and even used her Golden Compass to see if he was lying (he wasn't). But Lord Fa was still hesitant about helping find the bears armour. Thankfully, they were able to find out the location of the armour which was said to be in the basement of the priest's house and the bear took it back. But as it was travelling with Lyra back upstairs there was a group of police officers and the priest ready with their guns. Iorek almost killed the priest but luckily for the man Lyra begged the bear to stop and come with her to the ship where they could get ready to fight in the war. Iorek agreed and decided not to look back at all the policemen as he and Lyra walked away.

Chapter 15,

Lyra is now finally in the facility and started to get used to it. She met with a doctor and they measured her just like the day before. She was a bit confused as to why the measured each person and their daemon every day but later came to ask a couple of different questions relating to this topic. The first question she asked the doctor was why they cut people's daemons from their human companions, and the doctor told her that was a bunch of rubbish. But Lyra knew it wasn't true. Then she asked some more questions about Dust and why they want to know how much each person has in them. At this point, the doctor was extremely agitated but did his best to not show it. Soon enough, a fire drill came about and Lyra went with the nurse outside but later lost the adult in the chaos. All the kids were trying to enjoy a bit of freedom before the drill ended and clearly, the staff had no idea how to control them.

Chapter 16,

Lyra found Roger and Billy Costa (which were her friends back at Oxford College) and told them of her plan to help free the daemons that were in cages separated by their human partners (which were most likely either dead or ghosts like Tony). Serafina's daemon which was a majestic goose met Lyra outside of the facility and the little girl asked the animal for her help to open the door that held the daemons. the goose gracefully set off the laboratory alarm but the other adults didn't know it was ringing since the fire drill was still happening. So Lyra was able to successfully rescue around 10 daemons and the goose carried them with her back to wherever she was going. Before the witch's daemon left it told Lyra that the witches and gyptians were safe and that they were going to come to rescue her the very next day. Lyra thanked it and left to join the rest of the kids as if nothing ever happened.

Chapter 17,

When Lira or aka "Lizzie" met the kids she saw that they were all quiet or quietly whispering to one another. Some of them even looked scared, then she realized why. Ms Coulter was inside of a helicopter and heading towards the facility. While she saw the faces of the children and most of them pretended to look happy, she seemed not see Lyra in all of the chaos. Lyra was relieved and then told all the girls in her room about the escape plan but made sure that none of them said anything. The very next day, Ms Coulter found out where she was but seemed to put up her best sympathy act. That was when the witches and Iorek broke into the facility and Lyra ran with her daemon to them while smashing all of the fire alarm bells to cause a commotion. But in reality it was a que for the children to get their clothes redya and run towards the exit.

Now I just finished reading the whole book today, and because of that, I planned on finishing the summary today. However, there is still a lot of information available so I'm trying not to skip the important parts. Suddenly, Meilin, Tadoka, and Kovo start hearing the screeches from the "Many" entering the old city. And their leader seemed to be Conor, even though the three of them refused to believe it at first. That's when the Many started running across the streets toward the tower. Meilin was the first to enter the tower and use her quarterstaff to knock off some of the infected humans. Kovo and Tadoka used their combined power to make the rest of the "creatures" fall down. But the numbers started to grow bigger and bigger, Meilin didn't know how much longer they were going to last without some assistance. And coincidentally, Xanthe (the missing girl who as with them but got lost) was seen entering the city with a band of Setriolians at her side that was ready to fight as well. 

Tadoka was probably the happiest out of all of them and rushed towards Xanthe unafraid of the Many. That's when Xanthe suddenly gets a flashback. It's when Tadoka first entered Greenhaven (home of the Greencloaks) and was known for summoning Kovo the Great Ape. She was laughing and thought that everyone was joking. How could such a scrawny kid summon such a powerful beast. But she was mistaken because already Tadoka had saved her life twice and was seen to be much stronger than he looked like. And to think that this "kid" also had emotional feelings for her as well. Xanthe was very proud of him and looked forward to destroying the Wyrm with them. Tadoka rushed towards Meilin and told her that Xanthe wasn't dead at all, Meilin admitted that she had made a mistake but continues fighting the monsters.

That's when the egg dropped onto the ground. And when I say egg I mean the "shell" that the Wyrm is literally encased in. Now, of course, this egg didn't break once it hit the floor since it's made of an extremely hard substance but the reason it fell was that the Evertree's roots weren't able to hold it much longer. Meilin, Kovo, Tadoka, and Xanthe were disgusted by the look of the Wyrm. It had so many tentacles that she couldn't even count and the thing was slimy and dripped black ooze wherever it went. This definitely wasn't some type of Spirit Animal, it was just a plain monster. That's when the Wyrm grabbed Tadoka and Xanthe was ready to save him, she knew he would've done the same for her. But suddenly Kovo jumps from the bell tower, pounds the Wyrm into the ground and smashes the bell with the mallet. This gave the ape a chance to grab Tadoka away from harm and continue beating the Wyrm to a pulp.

But, as soon as the Great Beast smashed the bell the snare that it and the Hellens built to kill the Wyrm activated. The Wyrm wasn't able to get back up since the snare was sloping downwards into the abyss. All of the Many were trying to help it and since they thought they're leader was going to die they jumped into the hole as well. However, the snare for some reason stopped working halfway and the Wyrm was able to use its tentacles to grapple the nearest building and pull itself out of the hole. Now Meilin and Kovo were both confused but realized it was because the other bell above-ground hadn't rung yet. The Wyrm rushed upward and dug a hole up into the Earth and was traveling towards the surface. Meilin and Tadoka knew that they couldn't do anything since it would take too long to head back up so they just patiently waited for whatever the outcome was. Thankfully, as soon as Abeke found out how to finish the trap she launched an arrow at the bell and was able to get rid of the Wyrm for good.

Meanwhile, while Abeke and Rollan were catching up on all their previous enemies and talking to Shane who appears to be the leader of the Redcloaks, Meilin and Conor were having a difficult time figuring out what was happening in the city. They needed to find out how to destroy the Wyrm but didn't know where to start. Meilin also noticed every time one of the glowing orbs in the desolate city was dimming Kovo would immediately try to find a replacement. Soon enough, Tadoka and Kovo were coming back to the tower in which they were taking shelter when Kovo started acting extremely weird. He put his hand on his human companion and Tadoka started to have what looked like a seizure. Turns out that Shane, Abeke, and Rollan were using "Mulop the Octopus's" telekinesis to talk to them. And Kovo started talking (somehow speaking English) how he was the person who created the "snare" that was supposed to kill the Wyrm. 

He explained the whole story about how back then there were no humans, just animals, and the Evertree. And when that "egg" hit the Evertree from the sky it seemed to be trying to hatch. But the Evertree knew that it was a force of evil and used it's roots to try and contain whatever monster was inside. Now, the Evertree has no more strength left and the egg is starting to crack. But after Kovo discovered this he and the "Hellens" (first humans) create a device that was supposed to capture the Wyrm when it hatched. When hearing this Meilin seemed to not trust Kovo but Tadoka got furious and told Meilin to just trust the Great Beast for once. Meilin was surprised and kept her mouth shut but still needed to find out how to activate this device. That's when Kovo started using hand signals to try and point them in the right direction. 

Kovo couldn't speak because Mulop the Octopus's telekinesis was cut short by an evil force approaching them (Abeke and Rollan are "them"). Kovo brought Meilin and Tadoka a decently sized mallet that at first confused them. But then Tadoka was able to read Kovo's hand signal's better. Apparently, there are two bells, one below Erdas (where they are right now). And the other is above ground (where Rollan and Abeke are). Your supposed to use the mallet to hit the bells and that will make it so the ground will shake and a giant hole will appear. That hole is where the Wyrm is supposed to be trapped or fall into the abyss. After discussing this plan Meilin suddenly noticed that Conor was missing. She got really scared because Conor had basically turned into one of the "many", humans that have the parasite in them, the only difference is that unlike them he can still talk since he hasn't fully developed into one yet.

Then, all the glowstones in the city started to disappear one by one. Kovo seemed to suddenly be super nervous and the two of them knew why (Tadoka and Meilin). It's because those glowstones were the only things keeping the Many from not entering the city since they hate light. Conor must've used his deformity to his advantage by not benig affected by the light. So he destroyed each one and now the "Many" will bea ble to enter the city as a huge group surrounding the bell. Tadoka know understand why Kovo was trying to protect the bell, because if the "Many" destroy it then the only hope is for the bell on the top to be rang but of course they can't tell anyone since the top of Erdas in a fight with Zerif as of right now. So it is over.