Things are unraveling in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a universe that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An invisible force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is draining from authorities, and accumulating in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of conglomerates, the control of rioters. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and solid are deteriorating and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Just what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which continues where The Secret Commonwealth left off. This is, by all accounts, the author's concluding excursion into the intricately constructed, endlessly enchanting world he first unveiled three decades past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a domain whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose history diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans look and reason and act like us, but are paired by external spirits, essences in creature form; where the air are teeming with witches and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, vehicles are caught and tea is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which the author began this trilogy, is now a mature individual: still recognisably the prickly and tenacious heroine of the previous installments, but more mature, sadder, more careful, less sure. This restraint is intensified by her division from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to go off in quest of that childlike part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an quality which he represents as her "vision"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and risk on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in action, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the faith's ruling body, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of strict, procedural wickedness – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's uncle, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's governing body, and is set on using his newfound power to broaden the religion's control. A key character, who carried baby the heroine to safety along a swollen river as an child in the prequel, is now an academic with a secondary role in intelligence work: he is assigned to Geneva to find out more about Delamare's intentions. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and costly essential oil which seems in some way to be the origin of a social and financial upheaval rippling out from that area. The extract is viewed by certain groups as a tradeable product, by others as a empirical or esoteric wonder, and by yet others – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a origin of darkness; an challenge that must be destroyed. The question of its source, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
As in His Dark Materials, Lyra's actions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inextricably entwined with the future of the world
In its predecessor, these storylines ran largely in side by side. In this final book, they merge. As in His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her path are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the realm. Her private journey to reunite with her companion and rediscover her vision becomes the central battleground in a wider battle with an oppressive government which, as these systems often attempt, is striving to stifle autonomy of reason, innovation and expression: all the internal, resistant ways in which humans can be free.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The book begins with the discovery of a collection of curious fissures in the makeup of the world's air: gateways that appear to open into different dimensions. A particular window appears to be the origin of the much debated mystical extract. The authority, with its leader at its helm, labels these portals as a threat to the church's orthodoxy and endeavors to eliminate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from inflexible logic and back to feeling, however, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they provide is somehow vital – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the extract, or the creativity, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The stage for a philosophical tussle between naivety and experience is prepared.
Story Tempo and Character Development
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
