Things are falling apart in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's grand trilogies set in a universe that appears, now more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from authorities, and pooling in the halls of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says merchant a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and solid are deteriorating and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book ended. This is, reportedly, the author's concluding foray into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting universe he first unveiled in the distant past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose terrain aligns with that of the real world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the people look and think and act like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, essences in animal form; where the heavens are teeming with enchantresses and gryphons, but below, transports are caught and drinks is sipped, and middle-aged academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the spiky and tenacious main character of the previous installments, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, less sure. This limitation is heightened by her separation from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an quality which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her journey to reunite with him, were the incitements of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with amazement and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in action, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's controlling power, and the author's masterfully eerie embodiment of austere, administrative evil – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's relative, who blames her for his family member's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the authority's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his recently acquired authority to extend the institution's rule. Another protagonist, who rescued young Lyra to security along a flooded Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a secondary role in spycraft: he is dispatched to Geneva to learn more about the antagonist's plans. And underlying all of this is the mystery surrounding the rare and valuable essential oil which manifests somehow to be the source of a social and economic disturbance emanating out from the region. The substance is regarded by certain groups as a commercial commodity, by others as a research-based or mystical phenomenon, and by others still – the fanatical "men from the mountains" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be obliterated. The dilemma of where it comes from, what it stands for, and if it should be destroyed or protected is becoming urgent.
Similar to His Dark Materials, the heroine's decisions, and her destiny, are shown to be inseparably linked with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these storylines ran mostly in parallel. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her path are unveiled to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the universe. Her individual quest to reunite with her companion and rediscover her creativity becomes the key conflict in a broader conflict with an authoritarian system which, as such regimes typically do, is striving to stifle independence of thought, innovation and culture: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Ideological Conflicts
The novel starts with the unveiling of a series of unusual cracks in the fabric of the Earth's atmosphere: portals that appear to open into alternate realities. An example of a window seems to be the source of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The Magisterium, with its leader at its leadership, labels these portals as a challenge to the religion's orthodoxy and aims to destroy them. As Lyra begins to shift from strict rationalism and back to instinct, yet, her certainty that these locations must be preserved – that their significance and what they provide is mysteriously vital – strengthens. "The substance, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or whatever we call it," she says, "we need it." The scene for a philosophical struggle between naivety and experience is set.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
