Things are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a universe that seems, now more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or restructuring themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is shifting from states, and pooling in the chambers of religious leaders, the coffers of conglomerates, the control of rioters. "An element is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and strong are weakening and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that something might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding venture into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating world he first introduced 30 years ago, with the launch of Northern Lights. It's a domain whose terrain maps on to that of the real world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and reason and behave like us, but are joined by animal souls, beings in creature form; where the skies are filled with witches and legendary creatures, but below, buses are taken and beverages is drunk, and older scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a young girl in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the spiky and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but aged, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This restraint is intensified by her division from her daemon, her daemon – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
His choice to depart in search of that innocent part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an trait which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and risk on the way. But from the beginning, deeper currents were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of strict, procedural evil – is under new leadership, and flexing its muscles. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's uncle, who faults her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of head of the Magisterium's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his newfound power to extend the religion's rule. Malcolm Polstead, who carried infant the heroine to security along a flooded Thames as an child in the first book, is now an academic with a secondary role in spycraft: he is sent to a key location to find out more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and valuable botanical extract which manifests somehow to be the source of a social and economic disturbance rippling out from the region. The oil is regarded by some as a marketable product, by alternate groups as a empirical or spiritual phenomenon, and by yet others – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of evil; an affront that must be destroyed. The question of its source, its meaning, and if it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Like the first series, the heroine's actions, and her future, are revealed to be deeply connected with the fate of the realm
In the previous volume, these storylines ran broadly in side by side. In the conclusion, they merge. Similar to the first trilogy, the protagonist's choices and her destiny are unveiled to be inextricably woven with the destiny of the realm. Her personal mission to reconnect with her daemon and recover her imagination becomes the key battleground in a larger battle with an controlling system which, as these systems typically do, is attempting to suppress freedom of thinking, creativity and culture: all the inner, resistant ways in which humans can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The novel starts with the finding of a series of unusual fissures in the fabric of the world's atmosphere: portals that look to open into different dimensions. One such portal seems to be the source of the much debated mystical extract. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its leadership, labels these portals as a challenge to the institution's orthodoxy and endeavors to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from inflexible rationalism and return to feeling, nevertheless, her belief that these places must be defended – that their significance and their value is in some way essential – increases. "Dust, or the extract, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or whatever we call it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a poetic struggle between innocence and knowledge is prepared.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
