Things are unraveling in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from governments, and accumulating in the chambers of religious leaders, the coffers of business empires, the hands of crowds. "Something is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says businessman a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are faltering and giving way."
Core Enigma and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that animates the concluding book, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, Pullman's last excursion into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling realm he first introduced 30 years ago, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose landscape maps on to that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the humans appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in beast form; where the heavens are filled with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but below, buses are taken and beverages is drunk, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and determined heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This restraint is amplified by her split from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to leave in search of that youthful part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which saw the protagonist undertake a adventurous trek across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and peril on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and malevolent elements at work. The church authority – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling incarnation of strict, bureaucratic malice – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has positioned himself into the office of head of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to expand the institution's control. Another protagonist, who rescued infant Lyra to refuge along a swollen Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a sideline in espionage: he is dispatched to Geneva to discover more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly botanical extract which manifests mysteriously to be the origin of a social and financial crisis spreading out from the region. The substance is regarded by various factions as a commercial commodity, by different parties as a scientific or esoteric miracle, and by further factions – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a source of evil; an affront that must be obliterated. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like the original trilogy, the heroine's decisions, and her destiny, are revealed to be deeply linked with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these storylines ran mostly in tandem. In The Rose Field, they converge. Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's choices and her path are unveiled to be inseparably woven with the fate of the world. Her private quest to reunite with her daemon and rediscover her creativity becomes the central conflict in a larger battle with an oppressive system which, as these systems often attempt, is seeking to suppress freedom of thought, innovation and culture: all the internal, resistant ways in which people can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The novel opens with the discovery of a series of unusual cracks in the fabric of the world's sky: gateways that appear to give on to alternate realities. One such portal seems to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with the antagonist at its leadership, labels these windows as a threat to the institution's doctrine and aims to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid reason and revert to instinct, yet, her belief that these places must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they provide is somehow vital – strengthens. "The substance, or the extract, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a poetic struggle between purity and knowledge is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the