Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are failing, or restructuring themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from states, and gathering in the chambers of theocrats, the vaults of business empires, the hands of rioters. "An element is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an Aleppo cafe. "Things we thought were stable and solid are weakening and failing."
The Central Mystery and Her Quest
Exactly what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that animates The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book left off. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling world he first unveiled in the distant past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose terrain aligns with that of this world, but whose history tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and reason and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, beings in animal form; where the air are teeming with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but underneath, vehicles are taken and beverages is consumed, and mature professors carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a child in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a adult: still recognisably the spiky and determined protagonist of the previous installments, but older, more sorrowful, more careful, less sure. This circumscription is heightened by her split from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to depart in search of that innocent part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and peril on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in action, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the faith's governing authority, and the author's masterfully eerie representation of austere, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – the heroine's uncle, who faults her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the role of president of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is set on using his fresh power to extend the religion's dominium. A key character, who rescued baby Lyra to refuge along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a sideline in spycraft: he is assigned to a key location to learn more about the antagonist's intentions. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and precious rose oil which manifests somehow to be the origin of a social and financial crisis emanating out from Central Asia. The oil is viewed by various factions as a marketable product, by different parties as a scientific or mystical phenomenon, and by yet others – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a source of malevolence; an challenge that must be obliterated. The dilemma of its source, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or preserved is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like His Dark Materials, our protagonist's decisions, and her future, are shown to be inseparably linked with the destiny of the realm
In its predecessor, these narratives ran largely in tandem. In this final book, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, her movements and her path are shown to be inseparably woven with the future of the world. Her individual mission to reunite with her companion and rediscover her vision becomes the primary struggle in a broader battle with an oppressive regime which, as such regimes typically do, is striving to suppress independence of thought, innovation and culture: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The story begins with the unveiling of a set of strange openings in the structure of the planet's atmosphere: windows that look to give on to alternate realities. An example of a opening appears to be the origin of the highly contested rose oil. The authority, with Delamare at its head, labels these openings as a problem to the institution's orthodoxy and sets out to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to move from strict logic and back to instinct, yet, her certainty that these sites must be preserved – that their meaning and what they offer is mysteriously vital – strengthens. "Dust, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a philosophical struggle between purity and maturity is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
