Tings are collapsing in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's grand trilogies set in a universe that appears, in this volume especially, as a charged and skewed version of our own. Organizations are failing, or reassembling themselves along unfamiliar and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Power is flowing away from states, and accumulating in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of conglomerates, the control of mobs. "An element is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the trade routes from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and solid are weakening and giving way."
Key Puzzle and Her Quest
Exactly what that element might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that drives the concluding book, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's concluding venture into the elaborately built, endlessly enchanting world he first revealed three decades past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography aligns with that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and think and behave like us, but are paired by daemons, essences in creature form; where the skies are teeming with sorceresses and gryphons, but below, transports are ridden and beverages is sipped, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first met as a 12-year-old in the first trilogy, and then saw again as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the origin story with which Pullman began this trilogy, is now a adult: still clearly the spiky and determined heroine of the earlier books, but older, sadder, warier, more doubtful. This restraint is heightened by her division from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which led him to leave her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
Pan's decision to go off in pursuit of that youthful part of her which she seems to have lost (an quality which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the incitements of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous voyage across Europe and into the Caucasus, facing with marvel and peril on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in action, and darker forces at work. The religious council – the faith's controlling power, and the author's masterfully eerie incarnation of strict, bureaucratic evil – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's relative, who blames 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 fresh power to broaden the institution's rule. Another protagonist, who saved infant the heroine to refuge along a swollen river as an child in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a secondary role in spycraft: he is dispatched to Geneva to learn more about his aims. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the scarce and costly botanical extract which seems in some way to be the source of a social and economic disturbance emanating out from that area. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a marketable commodity, by alternate groups as a research-based or mystical miracle, and by further factions – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a source of darkness; an challenge that must be obliterated. The issue of its source, its meaning, and whether it should be removed or protected is becoming urgent.
Like the original trilogy, Lyra's actions, and her destiny, are shown to be inextricably connected with the fate of the universe
In the previous volume, these plots ran largely in parallel. In The Rose Field, they converge. Similar to the original series, her actions and her path are revealed to be deeply woven with the destiny of the universe. Her private mission to reunite with her soul and rediscover her vision becomes the key conflict in a larger battle with an authoritarian regime which, as these systems typically do, is seeking to suppress autonomy of reason, innovation and culture: all the internal, defiant ways in which humans can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The novel starts with the unveiling of a collection of unusual cracks in the makeup of the planet's atmosphere: gateways that look to lead to different dimensions. An example of a portal seems to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its helm, classifies these portals as a problem to the religion's orthodoxy and endeavors to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from inflexible reason and back to intuition, nevertheless, her certainty that these sites must be defended – that what they stand for and their value is somehow crucial – strengthens. "Dust, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we label it," she says, "it is necessary." The setting for a poetic struggle between innocence and maturity is established.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
