Tings are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that seems, in this volume especially, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is flowing away from governments, and gathering in the halls of religious leaders, the coffers of corporations, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, very quietly, gradually", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were stable and strong are faltering and collapsing."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Exactly what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that propels The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's final excursion into the elaborately built, deeply captivating universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose terrain aligns with that of our world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the air are teeming with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and beverages is consumed, and older academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which the author began the series, is now a adult: still recognisably the prickly and persistent heroine of the prior volumes, but older, sadder, more cautious, more doubtful. This restraint is heightened by her separation from her animal guide, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to depart in search of that childlike part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with amazement and risk on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the religious controlling power, and Pullman's masterfully eerie representation of strict, administrative malice – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of president of the authority's governing body, and is set on using his newfound authority to extend the institution's control. Another protagonist, who rescued infant Lyra to refuge along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in the prequel, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in spycraft: he is assigned to a key location to learn more about Delamare's plans. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and valuable rose oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a social and financial upheaval emanating out from that area. The oil is seen by certain groups as a marketable commodity, by different parties as a scientific or mystical wonder, and by others still – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an insult that must be eradicated. The issue of its source, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like the first series, our protagonist's deeds, and her fate, are demonstrated to be inseparably entwined with the future of the realm
In The Secret Commonwealth, these plots ran broadly in side by side. In this final book, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, her actions and her fate are unveiled to be inextricably linked with the future of the world. Her individual journey to reconnect with her soul and recover her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a wider war with an oppressive regime which, as these systems always have, is striving to stifle independence of thinking, originality and culture: all the internal, resistant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The novel starts with the finding of a collection of unusual openings in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: gateways that look to lead to alternate realities. One such opening seems to be the origin of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with Delamare at its leadership, designates these portals as a challenge to the institution's beliefs and endeavors to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict logic and back to instinct, nevertheless, her conviction that these locations must be protected – that what they stand for and what they offer is somehow essential – strengthens. "The substance, or the extract, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we call it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a Blakean struggle between naivety and maturity is prepared.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
