Things are falling apart in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that seems, in this volume especially, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from states, and accumulating in the halls of theocrats, the treasuries of corporations, the hands of rioters. "An element is at work, very quietly, gradually", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and durable are faltering and giving way."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that element might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which continues where the previous book left off. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's last excursion into the elaborately built, deeply captivating realm he first unveiled three decades past, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose geography aligns with that of this world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and reason and act like us, but are paired by animal souls, beings in creature form; where the skies are teeming with witches and legendary creatures, but below, transports are taken and drinks is drunk, and middle-aged scholars carry Harrods shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began the series, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the sharp and determined protagonist of the earlier books, but more mature, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This limitation is amplified by her split from her animal guide, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to go off in quest of that youthful part of her which she may have forgotten (an quality which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a wandering trek across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with amazement and danger on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the faith's ruling body, and the author's masterfully eerie representation of rigid, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of president of the authority's governing body, and is set on using his fresh influence to extend the institution's rule. Another protagonist, who carried young Lyra to refuge along a flooded river as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in spycraft: he is assigned to a key location to find out more about his aims. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly botanical extract which manifests somehow to be the source of a social and financial crisis emanating out from the region. The extract is seen by various factions as a commercial good, by different parties as a empirical or mystical wonder, and by further factions – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a source of evil; an challenge that must be eradicated. The question of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is escalating in importance.
Similar to the original trilogy, the heroine's deeds, and her future, are demonstrated to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the universe
In The Secret Commonwealth, these storylines ran largely in side by side. In this final book, they merge. As in the original series, her choices and her destiny are unveiled to be deeply entwined with the future of the universe. Her individual mission to reconnect with her soul and regain her vision becomes the primary battleground in a broader conflict with an controlling government which, as these systems typically do, is seeking to quell independence of thinking, originality and art: all the inner, resistant ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The book begins with the discovery of a set of strange cracks in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: windows that look to lead to different dimensions. A particular opening manifests to be the origin of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its head, labels these portals as a threat to the church's orthodoxy and sets out to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to move from strict logic and back to feeling, nevertheless, her conviction that these sites must be protected – that their meaning and what they provide is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the creativity, or the botanical realm, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a philosophical conflict between innocence and maturity is set.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
