Tings are falling apart in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that seems, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or reassembling themselves along novel and troubling lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from authorities, and gathering in the chambers of religious leaders, the coffers of business empires, the control of rioters. "An element is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were firm and durable are deteriorating and failing."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Just what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that animates The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book left off. This is, according to many, Pullman's concluding excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first revealed in the distant past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose landscape aligns with that of this world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and reason and act like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in beast form; where the heavens are teeming with sorceresses and gryphons, but underneath, transports are caught and drinks is sipped, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began the series, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the prickly and persistent protagonist of the earlier books, but older, sadder, more careful, less certain. This circumscription is amplified by her split from her animal guide, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to leave in search of that childlike part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering voyage across the continent and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and peril on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the religious ruling body, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of strict, bureaucratic malice – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's uncle, who holds responsible her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the office of leader of the authority's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his newfound power to expand the religion's rule. A key character, who rescued young the heroine to safety along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a secondary role in espionage: he is assigned to the city to find out more about his aims. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and costly essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic upheaval emanating out from Central Asia. The substance is viewed by some as a tradeable product, by different parties as a scientific or esoteric miracle, and by yet others – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of darkness; an insult that must be eradicated. The issue of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or preserved is becoming urgent.
Similar to the first series, Lyra's actions, and her future, are revealed to be inseparably connected with the fate of the world
In The Secret Commonwealth, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In this final book, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her path are shown to be deeply woven with the future of the universe. Her private mission to reunite with her companion and regain her imagination becomes the primary battleground in a larger conflict with an controlling government which, as these systems typically do, is seeking to quell freedom of reason, innovation and expression: all the internal, resistant ways in which people can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The book begins with the finding of a series of unusual openings in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: portals that look to give on to other worlds. An example of a window seems to be the source of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The Magisterium, with its leader at its head, designates these portals as a problem to the religion's orthodoxy and endeavors to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to shift from rigid logic and revert to instinct, yet, her conviction that these places must be defended – that what they stand for and what they provide is in some way crucial – strengthens. "The substance, or the substance, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a poetic conflict between purity and maturity is set.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
