Things are unraveling in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a world that seems, in this volume especially, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along new and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is draining from states, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of conglomerates, the grasp of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are faltering and giving way."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that drives the concluding book, which resumes where the previous book ended. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding foray into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting world he first introduced 30 years ago, with the publication of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and reason and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, beings in creature form; where the skies are populated with sorceresses and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, vehicles are caught and drinks is sipped, and middle-aged professors carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first met as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still distinctly the sharp and persistent heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, sadder, warier, less certain. This circumscription is intensified by her division from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to leave in search of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an trait which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque trek across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and risk on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in play, and sinister powers at work. The church authority – the faith's governing authority, and the author's deliciously chilling incarnation of strict, procedural wickedness – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's relative, who blames her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of leader of the authority's High Council, and is intent on using his fresh influence to broaden the institution's rule. A key character, who carried infant Lyra to refuge along a overflowing river as an 11-year-old in the first book, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is assigned to the city to discover more about Delamare's plans. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and precious essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the source of a social and financial upheaval rippling out from Central Asia. The oil is regarded by various factions as a marketable good, by alternate groups as a empirical or esoteric wonder, and by others still – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its source, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, our protagonist's actions, and her fate, are revealed to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the realm
In the previous volume, these plots ran mostly in side by side. In The Rose Field, they converge. As in the first trilogy, her actions and her destiny are unveiled to be deeply entwined with the future of the universe. Her personal quest to reconnect with her daemon and recover her imagination becomes the primary battleground in a broader war with an authoritarian system which, as such authorities typically do, is striving to suppress independence of thought, creativity and expression: all the inner, resistant ways in which humans can be independent.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The novel opens with the unveiling of a series of unusual fissures in the makeup of the world's sky: windows that appear to lead to alternate realities. One such window manifests to be the source of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its head, designates these openings as a challenge to the institution's doctrine and aims to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to move from inflexible rationalism and back to intuition, nevertheless, her belief that these sites must be protected – that their meaning and what they offer is somehow essential – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or no matter what we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a poetic struggle between innocence and maturity is established.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
