Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's grand trilogies set in a world that appears, now more than ever, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the hands of rioters. "An element is at work, silently, gradually", says merchant a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and durable are faltering and giving way."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the mystery that animates this final volume, which resumes where its predecessor left off. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's last venture into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling realm he first unveiled in the distant past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose landscape maps on to that of our world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals look and reason and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, beings in creature form; where the air are populated with enchantresses and mythical beasts, but below, transports are taken and tea is consumed, and older scholars carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the first volume, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the spiky and persistent heroine of the previous installments, but aged, more sorrowful, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is heightened by her separation from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to depart in search of that youthful part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the incitements of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the faith's ruling body, and the author's brilliantly sinister representation of austere, administrative wickedness – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's uncle, who blames her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the authority's High Council, and is set on using his recently acquired influence to extend the institution's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued young the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an child in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a sideline in espionage: he is assigned to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's plans. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and precious botanical extract which appears mysteriously to be the cause of a social and economic upheaval emanating out from Central Asia. The oil is viewed by certain groups as a marketable good, by different parties as a research-based or spiritual phenomenon, and by further factions – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a wellspring of evil; an affront that must be obliterated. The issue of its source, what it stands for, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
Similar to the first series, the heroine's decisions, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply connected with the destiny of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran mostly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they merge. Like His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her fate are shown to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the realm. Her individual mission to reunite with her soul and recover her imagination becomes the primary struggle in a wider battle with an authoritarian system which, as these systems always have, is seeking to quell freedom of thinking, creativity and expression: all the inner, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The story starts with the finding of a set of unusual fissures in the structure of the planet's sky: windows that seem to give on to other worlds. A particular portal appears to be the source of the highly contested rose oil. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its leadership, designates these portals as a challenge to the church's doctrine and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from strict logic and back to feeling, yet, her belief that these locations must be defended – that what they stand for and what they offer is somehow essential – increases. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a philosophical struggle between innocence and experience is established.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
