Things are collapsing in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that manifests, in this volume especially, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reorganizing themselves along novel and disturbing 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 authorities, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the coffers of business empires, the grasp of crowds. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says merchant Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his seat in an city cafe. "Things we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Just what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which continues where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final venture into the carefully crafted, deeply captivating realm he first introduced three decades past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of our world, but whose past diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and reason and act like us, but are joined by external spirits, essences in animal form; where the skies are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but below, buses are taken and beverages is consumed, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the prequel, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the prickly and tenacious main character of the earlier books, but more mature, sadder, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is intensified by her separation from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to go off in quest of that innocent part of the heroine which she may have forgotten (an quality which he represents as her "imagination"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with marvel and peril on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in play, and sinister powers at work. The church authority – the faith's ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister embodiment of austere, bureaucratic wickedness – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. The antagonist – the heroine's relative, who faults her for his sibling's death – has positioned himself into the position of president of the church's governing body, and is set on using his newfound authority to expand the church's control. Another protagonist, who saved infant Lyra to refuge along a overflowing Thames as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is sent to the city to learn more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and costly rose oil which seems in some way to be the cause of a social and financial disturbance spreading out from Central Asia. The extract is seen by some as a marketable product, by different parties as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by yet others – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its source, what it stands for, and if it should be destroyed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Similar to the original trilogy, the heroine's actions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the world
In the previous volume, these plots ran broadly in parallel. In this final book, they merge. Like the first trilogy, her actions and her fate are unveiled to be deeply linked with the destiny of the universe. Her private quest to rejoin with her soul and recover her creativity becomes the central battleground in a broader battle with an controlling government which, as these systems typically do, is attempting to stifle freedom of reason, innovation and culture: all the personal, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The novel starts with the unveiling of a collection of unusual openings in the makeup of the planet's sky: windows that look to open into alternate realities. An example of a window appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The Magisterium, with its leader at its leadership, designates these windows as a threat to the institution's doctrine and sets out to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from rigid reason and revert to feeling, yet, her belief that these places must be defended – that their meaning and their value is somehow crucial – increases. "The substance, or the extract, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a philosophical tussle between innocence and experience is set.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
