The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ.

As soon as I saw this book on the shelf, I guessed that it was going to be a weird attempt to undermine the gospel. And I was spot on.
Don't get me wrong, I think Pullman's an exceptionally good writer (in the ability sense, not the moral sense!). But I'd already felt let down in a big way by the end of 'His Dark Materials' trilogy, where God is reduced to a wizened old man in a cage. Thus the low expectations (which were, upon reading, met!) on seeing this book in Tesco.
Extraordinarily, the book is billed thus: "In this ingenious and spell-binding retelling of the life of Jesus, Philip Pullman revisits the most influential story ever told."
Having read the book, I'm not sure how it can be called either 'ingenious' or 'spell-binding'. I found the first large chunk of the book stilted and badly written. The back cover screams 'THIS IS A STORY' at you. My response would be, 'not a very good one'.
Brief summary would be to say that Jesus and his twin brother Christ are born to Mary, following a conversation with an "angel" (although Pullman seems to be desperate to suggest that the angel was some bloke at the window just calling himself an angel) Jesus grows to be a carpenter and then great teacher (inspired by John the Baptist's example) while Christ his brother follows him round with a pen a paper (tablet and stylus) taking notes. Christ has intermittent conversations with a 'stranger' who helps him to discover a great role and purpose. Christ goes on to betray his brother, be mistaken for him following his death and is then given the chance to 'rewrite history' by heavily editing all his notes to make Jesus sound better than he really was.
But lets look at some positives to start with. Firstly, Pullman does rely on scripture for much of 'Jesus'' teaching. Strangely, there are times when it seems that the author couldn't decide whether to write this in an archaic form, or a refreshing, up-to-date fashion... Secondly, the book itself will perhaps open up some lines of conversation with others about the truth.

However, the negatives are perhaps more glaringly obvious. Pullman makes a number of desperate attempts to 'demiraculise' (Ok, so that's not actually a word, I know) the miracle stories. Classic example being the feeding of the 5000 (or the 'crowd' as Pullman says). "[Jesus] took the loaves and the fishes and blessed them, and said to the crowd "See how I share this food out? You do the same. There'll be enough for everyone. And sure enough it turned out that one man had brought some barley cakes, another had a couple of apples, and a third had some dried fish, and a fourth had a pocketful of raisins, and so on; and between them all, there was plenty to go round. No one was left hungry." Well, we've heard that explanation before, and it never has been of any real value. Why would the disciples have wanted to send everyone away to eat? And why would those people who had thought to bring food have brought enough to feed others too? And why would there have been 12 baskets of leftovers? It's just all clutching at straws. And that happens time and time again. It's always trying to downgrade the truth and I found myself swinging between frustration at Pullman and pity for him. It's such a tragic waste of great talent.

But perhaps more insidious is the direct attack on truth, "...we must be prepared to make history the handmaid of posterity and not its governor. What should have been is a better servant of the Kingdom than what was." So basically, the gospel is made up, because it's a better story that way. Well, I have to say, Pullman's made this lot up, and it certainly didn't turn out any better!
Some of the storyline is woefully predictable, when you take into account the fact that this is written by someone who appears to have an axe to grind. Most notably, perhaps, the fact that 'Christ' (Jesus' twin brother...) has sex with someone. It had to happen. Any reason for a bit of sex these days!
I've written more than I intended to here. For another view on this book (well, similar view, different reviewer!) check this out.
Pullman's own website claims, "I'm not in the message business; I'm in the “Once upon a time” business." I don't think he's being entirely honest :)
I think if I could use one word to sum this book up, it would be 'lame'. That sounds really harsh I guess, but I mean it in both senses of the term. I feel that the book is crippled by the author's apparent desire to undermine the gospel.