Things are falling apart in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a realm that appears, now more than ever, as a intense and tilted version of our own. Establishments are crumbling, or reorganizing themselves along new and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Authority is draining from authorities, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the coffers of business empires, the grasp of mobs. "An element is at work, silently, gradually", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the ancient paths from his post in an city cafe. "Aspects we thought were secure and strong are deteriorating and giving way."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Exactly what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which continues where its predecessor ended. This is, reportedly, the author's last venture into the elaborately built, deeply captivating universe he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose landscape maps on to that of our world, but whose chronicles veers and changes with ours; where the humans look and think and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in animal form; where the skies are teeming with sorceresses and legendary creatures, but below, vehicles are ridden and beverages is sipped, and mature scholars carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a 12-year-old in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then met once more as a toddler in the prequel, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still recognisably the sharp and persistent main character of the prior volumes, but older, sadder, more cautious, more doubtful. This circumscription is intensified by her split from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to go off in pursuit of that childlike part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an trait which he represents as her "creativity"), and her journey to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which followed Lyra undertake a picaresque voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and risk on the way. But from the beginning, profound shifts were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's controlling power, and Pullman's brilliantly sinister representation of strict, bureaucratic evil – is under recent guidance, and showing its strength. The antagonist – Lyra's relative, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the role of head of the Magisterium's High Council, and is intent on using his recently acquired power to broaden the church's rule. A key character, who saved baby the heroine to security along a overflowing Thames as an 11-year-old in La Belle Sauvage, is now an academic with a secondary role in espionage: he is sent to Geneva to learn more about his plans. And beneath all of this is the mystery surrounding the uncommon and valuable rose oil which manifests in some way to be the origin of a societal and economic disturbance emanating out from the region. The extract is regarded by various factions as a commercial good, by others as a empirical or spiritual miracle, and by yet others – the extremist "highland figures" – as a origin of malevolence; an insult that must be destroyed. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and if it should be destroyed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the first series, Lyra's decisions, and her future, are shown to be inseparably entwined with the future of the world
In the previous volume, these narratives ran mostly in side by side. In the conclusion, they merge. As in His Dark Materials, the protagonist's actions and her fate are shown to be inextricably linked with the future of the world. Her private mission to reunite with her companion and recover her creativity becomes the central conflict in a larger war with an oppressive system which, as such authorities typically do, is seeking to stifle autonomy of reason, innovation and art: all the personal, defiant ways in which humans can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Moral Battles
The novel opens with the unveiling of a series of unusual fissures in the makeup of the Earth's sky: windows that look to open into other worlds. An example of a portal appears to be the source of the highly contested mystical extract. The Magisterium, with Delamare at its leadership, classifies these portals as a threat to the religion's beliefs and sets out to eradicate them. As the heroine begins to move from strict logic and return to feeling, however, her belief that these sites must be preserved – that their meaning and what they offer is in some way crucial – strengthens. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we need it." The stage for a philosophical conflict between purity and knowledge is set.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
