Things are collapsing in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that manifests, in this volume especially, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Institutions are failing, or reorganizing themselves along new and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is draining from authorities, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of corporations, the grasp of mobs. "Some force is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were secure and solid are weakening and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling universe he first unveiled in the distant past, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose terrain corresponds to that of this world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the people look and reason and behave like us, but are paired by daemons, souls in creature form; where the air are teeming with enchantresses and gryphons, but underneath, buses are taken and drinks is consumed, and mature scholars carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then revisited as a infant in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still clearly the spiky and persistent heroine of the prior volumes, but more mature, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This limitation is heightened by her split from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to depart in search of that youthful part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the driving forces of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, underlying forces were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of rigid, bureaucratic wickedness – is under fresh command, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the position of head of the church's High Council, and is set on using his fresh authority to extend the institution's control. A key character, who carried infant the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an child in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is assigned to Geneva to find out more about his intentions. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the uncommon and precious botanical extract which seems in some way to be the cause of a societal and economic crisis rippling out from that area. The oil is seen by various factions as a commercial product, by others as a scientific or esoteric wonder, and by further factions – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be obliterated. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, Lyra's deeds, and her fate, are demonstrated to be deeply linked with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In the conclusion, they converge. Like the original series, her actions and her path are shown to be inseparably woven with the future of the world. Her private journey to reunite with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the primary conflict in a larger conflict with an authoritarian regime which, as these systems often attempt, is striving to suppress autonomy of thought, originality and art: all the personal, rebellious ways in which individuals can be free.
Cosmic Openings and Moral Battles
The story begins with the unveiling of a collection of curious fissures in the structure of the Earth's sky: portals that appear to give on to different dimensions. A particular portal manifests to be the source of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The authority, with Delamare at its head, labels these windows as a challenge to the religion's beliefs and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to move from strict reason and return to instinct, yet, her conviction that these sites must be protected – that their meaning and their value is somehow crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or the extract, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a poetic tussle between naivety and knowledge is set.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
