Things are unraveling in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the next of the author's masterful trilogies set in a realm that appears, here more than ever, as a intense and slanted version of our own. Establishments are failing, or reorganizing themselves along new and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from authorities, and gathering in the chambers of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the hands of rioters. "Some force is at work, stealthily, gradually", says businessman a trader character, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and strong are deteriorating and collapsing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the mystery that animates this final volume, which continues where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, the author's last excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting realm he first unveiled 30 years ago, with the release of Northern Lights. It's a realm whose terrain aligns with that of our world, but whose past veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and think and behave like us, but are paired by external spirits, souls in creature form; where the skies are filled with witches and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, buses are caught and tea is drunk, and older scholars carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in the first volume, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a adult: still recognisably the spiky and persistent heroine of the previous installments, but older, melancholic, more careful, less sure. This limitation is amplified by her division from her soul companion, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the catalyst which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
Pan's decision to depart in pursuit of that innocent part of her which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her journey to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, encountering with amazement and danger on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in action, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister incarnation of austere, bureaucratic evil – is under new leadership, and showing its strength. Marcel Delamare – Lyra's family member, who faults her for his sibling's death – has worked himself into the role of leader of the authority's High Council, and is set on using his fresh authority to extend the church's rule. Another protagonist, who carried baby Lyra to refuge along a overflowing river as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is sent to a key location to discover more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and valuable botanical extract which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a social and economic disturbance spreading out from the region. The extract is seen by certain groups as a commercial good, by alternate groups as a scientific or esoteric miracle, and by others still – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The question of where it comes from, its meaning, and whether it should be eliminated or preserved is becoming urgent.
As in the original trilogy, Lyra's actions, and her fate, are revealed to be inseparably linked with the destiny of the realm
In the previous volume, these storylines ran largely in side by side. In The Rose Field, they come together. Like the first trilogy, her movements and her fate are revealed to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the realm. Her personal quest to reunite with her daemon and recover her vision becomes the key conflict in a broader battle with an authoritarian regime which, as such regimes always have, is seeking to suppress freedom of thought, originality and expression: all the internal, rebellious ways in which humans can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Philosophical Struggles
The story starts with the finding of a set of curious openings in the fabric of the planet's atmosphere: portals that seem to give on to other worlds. One such portal appears to be the point of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its head, classifies these portals as a challenge to the religion's orthodoxy and endeavors to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to turn away from rigid rationalism and revert to instinct, nevertheless, her conviction that these places must be preserved – that their significance and their value is somehow essential – increases. "Dust, or the extract, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a philosophical struggle between naivety and knowledge is established.
Plot Rhythm and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
