Tings are collapsing in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a world that seems, in this volume especially, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along new and troubling lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from governments, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of corporations, the control of mobs. "Something is at work, very quietly, gradually", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are faltering and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first introduced 30 years ago, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and reason and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the skies are filled with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, vehicles are ridden and tea is drunk, and mature scholars carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still clearly the spiky and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but older, melancholic, more careful, less sure. This circumscription is intensified by her split from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to depart in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she appears to have shed (an trait which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a adventurous journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and risk on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the faith's governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling embodiment of austere, bureaucratic malice – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to broaden the institution's control. Another protagonist, who carried young the heroine to safety along a flooded river as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in spycraft: he is sent to a key location to find out more about the antagonist's intentions. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and valuable rose oil which appears in some way to be the source of a social and financial disturbance spreading out from that area. The substance is viewed by some as a marketable good, by different parties as a empirical or mystical phenomenon, and by yet others – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of evil; an affront that must be obliterated. The issue of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to the first series, the heroine's decisions, and her destiny, are revealed to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran largely in side by side. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the original series, the protagonist's actions and her fate are unveiled to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the realm. Her personal quest to reconnect with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the key conflict in a larger war with an controlling government which, as such authorities typically do, is seeking to stifle autonomy of thinking, originality and expression: all the personal, rebellious ways in which humans can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The story starts with the unveiling of a series of curious openings in the fabric of the world's sky: windows that appear to give on to alternate realities. One such opening manifests to be the origin of the much debated mystical extract. The church, with its leader at its helm, labels these portals as a problem to the church's beliefs and sets out to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from inflexible rationalism and back to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these locations must be preserved – that their significance and what they provide is somehow vital – grows. "Cosmic particles, or the substance, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a philosophical tussle between innocence and maturity is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
