Things are collapsing in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a universe that appears, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from governments, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of business empires, the grasp of crowds. "Some force is at work, very quietly, gradually", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are deteriorating and giving way."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that drives this final volume, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's final excursion into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating realm he first introduced in the distant past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of this world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals appear and reason and act like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the skies are teeming with enchantresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, vehicles are taken and tea is consumed, and middle-aged scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the prequel with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still clearly the sharp and tenacious heroine of the previous installments, but aged, sadder, more careful, less certain. This restraint is amplified by her separation from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to go off in search of that youthful part of her which she appears to have shed (an trait which he represents as her "imagination"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of austere, procedural evil – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's relative, who faults her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the role of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his newfound power to broaden the religion's rule. Another protagonist, who rescued baby the heroine to security along a flooded river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in spycraft: he is assigned to a key location to learn more about the antagonist's aims. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly botanical extract which manifests in some way to be the cause of a societal and economic upheaval rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is viewed by various factions as a marketable good, by different parties as a research-based or mystical miracle, and by further factions – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a source of darkness; an challenge that must be destroyed. The question of its origins, its significance, and if it should be eliminated or protected is escalating in importance.
Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's deeds, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply connected with the future of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran largely in parallel. In this final book, they merge. Like the first trilogy, her movements and her fate are revealed to be inseparably woven with the destiny of the universe. Her private journey to reconnect with her soul and rediscover her creativity becomes the key struggle in a broader conflict with an authoritarian regime which, as such regimes often attempt, is seeking to suppress independence of thinking, innovation and expression: all the internal, defiant ways in which individuals can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The novel opens with the finding of a collection of curious cracks in the fabric of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that seem to give on to different dimensions. An example of a opening appears to be the origin of the much debated botanical substance. The church, with the antagonist at its head, classifies these portals as a threat to the religion's beliefs and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid rationalism and back to feeling, however, her conviction that these places must be protected – that what they stand for and what they offer is in some way vital – grows. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a poetic struggle between purity and knowledge is prepared.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
