Things are falling apart in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's masterful trilogies set in a realm that appears, in this volume especially, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along new and disquieting lines. An unseen force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is draining from governments, and accumulating in the halls of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the hands of rioters. "Something is at work, silently, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are faltering and failing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that animates this final volume, which picks up where its predecessor left off. This is, reportedly, the author's last excursion into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting universe he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a realm whose geography aligns with that of this world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and reason and behave like us, but are joined by daemons, beings in animal form; where the air are teeming with witches and mythical beasts, but beneath those skies, transports are caught and tea is consumed, and older academics carry Harrods shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first introduced to as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in the prequel, the origin story with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and determined heroine of the previous installments, but more mature, sadder, warier, less sure. This restraint is amplified by her split from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to depart in pursuit of that innocent part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an trait which he represents as her "imagination"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which followed Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the mountain region, facing with marvel and danger on the way. But from the beginning, underlying forces were in motion, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the faith's ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling representation of austere, bureaucratic wickedness – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the office of leader of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his recently acquired authority to extend the institution's dominium. Another protagonist, who rescued infant Lyra to safety along a overflowing river as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is assigned to Geneva to learn more about Delamare's plans. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and valuable rose oil which seems somehow to be the origin of a social and economic crisis rippling out from that area. The extract is seen by certain groups as a marketable good, by alternate groups as a scientific or mystical miracle, and by yet others – the fanatical "highland figures" – as a source of evil; an affront that must be eradicated. The dilemma of its source, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is becoming urgent.
As in the original trilogy, our protagonist's deeds, and her future, are shown to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the realm
In the previous volume, these storylines ran largely in tandem. In The Rose Field, they come together. As in the original series, her movements and her destiny are shown to be inextricably woven with the destiny of the world. Her private journey to reconnect with her daemon and regain her creativity becomes the primary struggle in a larger war with an controlling regime which, as such authorities typically do, is attempting to stifle independence of thought, innovation and expression: all the personal, resistant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The novel starts with the unveiling of a series of curious openings in the fabric of the Earth's air: gateways that look to give on to other worlds. One such window manifests to be the point of the highly contested mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its leadership, classifies these portals as a challenge to the institution's doctrine and aims to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to move from rigid rationalism and back to intuition, yet, her belief that these locations must be preserved – that their meaning and what they offer is in some way vital – grows. "Dust, or the substance, or the vision, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a philosophical conflict between purity and knowledge is established.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
