�Sally Lockhart finds herself enmeshed in the perplexing clues surrounding her father's death, in this rousing Victorian thriller� (Publishers Weekly 1998). The Ruby in the Smoke is about sixteen year old Sally, who lives in Victorian London. Her father has recently died mysteriously and Sally finds herself involved in a mystery concerning the opium trade, a missing ruby, and the truth about her past.
Both stories have extremely well developed characters. Horn Book Guide says of The Subtle Knife, �each of the players in this vast game is clear and distinct� (1998). In The Subtle Knife, Lyra is brave, stubborn and loyal. She feels scared and out of place in Will�s world, because it�s so different from her own world. Sally, in The Ruby in the Smoke, also feels scared and out of place. She�s living with an aunt who doesn�t like her due to the recent death of her father. She ends up leaving, but has nowhere to go. She meets a photographer, Frederick, and his sister, Rosa, who give her a place to stay and become her friends. Lyra meets Will, who also becomes a friend and ally and helps Lyra adjust to her surroundings. Will, like Lyra, is brave and stubborn. He will do anything to protect his mother, which is how he ended up in an alternate world in the first place. Like Will and Lyra, Sally is extremely self sufficient and determined. She knows that inquiring about her father�s death may land her in trouble, but she persists anyway. All three characters have living parents at the start of the stories, but are seen as orphan-like figures. Sally, at least, did have a father figure in the majority of her life. Will and Lyra on the other hand, didn't really. This is similar to Pullman's own childhood. His father was in the Royal Air Force and was never really around (Pullman 1993).
Some of the main character differences between those in The Ruby in the Smoke and those in The Subtle Knife can be explained by the genres of the stories. The Subtle Knife is fantasy. Lyra and Will both have supernatural gifts. Lyra can read the alethiometer, and Will can use the magic subtle knife to open and close rifts between worlds. There are other characters in The Subtle Knife that are otherworldly. There is Serafina, the witch, daemons (animal companions in Lyra�s world), and Sceptors, who steal the souls of adult humans. The Ruby in the Smoke is not fantasy, but a realistic mystery set in the past. Sally has no special superhuman abilities and there is no magic involved in this story. Sally is however, a heroic individual who seems larger than life, much like Will and Lyra. All three manage to outsmart adults and those more powerful than them who are trying to hurt them. It's interesting how Pullman puts a little bit of himself into some of the more minor characters. For instance, Jim, a messenger boy in The Ruby in the Smoke, is obsessed with comics. Pullman is a self proclaimed comic book fanatic (Pullman 1993).
In both stories the antagonists are extremely evil. In The Subtle Knife, there are Sir Charles and Mrs. Coulter who are both greedy, selfish, and will stop at nothing to get what they want. The greater evil in The Subtle Knife and in the His Dark Materials series is the Church. Pullman doesn't believe in the hierarchical system involved in organized religions and he incorporates this belief into the His Dark Materials series (Guardian Unlimited 2002). A similar thing happens in The Ruby in the Smoke. Mrs. Holland and Van Eeden are both evil. Mrs. Holland will stop at nothing to get the ruby and Van Eeden has killed Sally�s father over the opium trade. But like The Subtle Knife, there is a greater evil in this novel too, the opium trade itself. It�s turned men into greedy murderers and has created addicts out of many.
The plots in both stories are action packed and full of suspense and mystery. Pullman definitely knows how to tell a good story, something that he learned from his grandfather, who could take �the simplest little event and make a story out of it� (Pullman 1993). In The Subtle Knife, �action is rapid and occasionally violent� (School Library Journal 1997). Life and death situations are encountered in both. In The Subtle Knife, there�s Will and Lyra�s run in with Tullio, a crazy young man with the subtle knife (Pullman 1997, 156). In The Ruby in the Smoke, there�s Sally�s abduction by Van Eeden when he pulls a knife on her and she shoots him (Pullman 1985, 220). This also serves as the climax to The Ruby in the Smoke. The resolution occurs when Sally discovers the money her father has hidden away for her (Pullman 1985, 228). The Ruby in the Smoke has multiple climaxes which include Mrs. Holland�s death (Pullman 1985, 213), and Sally�s realization that her biological father had traded her to her adopted father for the ruby (Pullman 1985, 208), just to name a few. The Subtle Knife also has multiple climaxes which are too numerous to name them all. There is the scene where Lee Scoresby is killed (Pullman 1997, 270) and the moment when Will realizes he has found his father, but then a witch kills his father (Pullman 1997, 284). A big difference in the plots of the two stories is that evil is defeated and the conflict resolved by the end of The Ruby in the Smoke. This isn�t true in The Subtle Knife. Will and Lyra�s quest isn�t over and will be continued in another book. The Ruby in the Smoke is part of a series too, but each book has it�s own definitive resolution, unlike the books in the His Dark Materials series.
The settings are extremely different in these two books, but are both very important to the plot. In The Subtle Knife, there are alternate worlds with magical creatures, talking animals and other fantastical elements. Pullman is an animal lover, which is probably why daemons came to exist in the His Dark Materials series (Pullman 1993). Pullman has created and incredibly complex and believable world even with its fantastical elements. In The Ruby in the Smoke, the story is set in Victorian London. The fact that it�s set in the past is important because it affects Sally�s life. Her father was a shipping agent, something that isn�t very important today in the day and age of air travel. Also, the opium trade was in fact very big in the eastern part of the world during this time period. If the book had been set in present time, Sally�s life and situation would be very different from what they are in this book.
The themes of The Subtle Knife are the classic good versus evil and the power of friendship. We see similar themes in The Ruby in the Smoke. Will and Lyra depend on each other, much like Sally depends on Frederick and Rosa. There�s also the theme of good versus evil in The Ruby in the Smoke as we see Sally and her friends battling against those involved in the opium trade. In The Ruby in the Smoke another theme emerges, that money and drugs can ruin lives. Mrs. Holland, Sally�s father, Van Eeden, Major Marchbanks and Matthew Bedwell all lose their lives because of the opium trade. Pullman is a big believer in the idea that power corrupts (Guardian Unlimited 2002). We certainly see this theme in these two books and in the other books in these two series.
Both stories are told in third person point of view. Both use dialogue a lot to reveal characters and give readers information. For instance, in The Subtle Knife, we learn that Lyra�s destiny is to become the biblical Eve from a conversation between a witch and Mrs. Coulter. In The Ruby in the Smoke, we learn of Sally�s past in a conversation between Sally and Mrs. Holland. In both stories, the narrator is omniscient of the main characters� thoughts (Lyra, Will and Sally). In both stories the mood is dark and suspenseful, with a few light moments thrown in to help lift the mood. School Library Journal says about The Ruby in the Smoke, �Subtle innuendos enhance character development, and the understated humor keeps readers from taking the story too seriously� (1987). In The Ruby in the Smoke, these light moments come from Frederick and Rosa�s humorous squabbles. In The Subtle Knife, a light moment comes from Lyra�s astonishment over Coke and her attempt to cook an omelet (Pullman 1997, 50). In both stories, the writing is very descriptive. In reference to The Ruby in the Smoke, School Library Journal says �Descriptions are vivid, colorful, and fully realized� (1987). "The whole is presented in a rush of sensuous detail that moves and entrances.� says Kirkus Reviews of The Subtle Knife (1997).