Things are collapsing in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the next of Philip Pullman's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that seems, now more than ever, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or restructuring themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from governments, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of corporations, the control of mobs. "Something is at work, very quietly, very subtly", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Precisely what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the question that propels the concluding book, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting universe he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape corresponds to that of this world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the people look and reason and behave like us, but are joined by animal souls, essences in beast form; where the air are filled with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but below, transports are taken and drinks is consumed, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first met as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still clearly the sharp and determined heroine of the prior volumes, but aged, sadder, more careful, less certain. This restraint is heightened by her split from her animal guide, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to go off in search of that innocent part of Lyra which she seems to have lost (an quality which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a adventurous trek across the continent and into the mountain region, facing with wonder and danger on the way. But from the start, deeper currents were in motion, and darker forces at work. The church authority – the religious governing authority, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of rigid, administrative evil – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – Lyra's uncle, who blames her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the Magisterium's governing body, and is determined on using his newfound authority to broaden the church's rule. Another protagonist, who saved young the heroine to safety along a flooded Thames as an child in the first book, is now an academic with a additional duty in espionage: he is assigned to a key location to find out more about the antagonist's intentions. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and precious essential oil which manifests somehow to be the origin of a societal and economic crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a tradeable commodity, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by further factions – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of evil; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its origins, what it stands for, and whether it should be removed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
Like His Dark Materials, our protagonist's decisions, and her destiny, are revealed to be deeply linked with the future of the realm
In the previous volume, these storylines ran mostly in parallel. In the conclusion, they converge. Like His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions and her destiny are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the world. Her individual mission to rejoin with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the central conflict in a larger battle with an controlling government which, as these systems always have, is seeking to suppress independence of thought, innovation and expression: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The book opens with the finding of a set of curious fissures in the makeup of the world's sky: windows that look to give on to different dimensions. A particular window seems to be the origin of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its helm, classifies these portals as a threat to the institution's doctrine and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict rationalism and return to instinct, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be protected – that their meaning and what they provide is mysteriously essential – increases. "The substance, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or no matter what we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a Blakean tussle between innocence and maturity is set.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
