Things are unraveling in the final volume of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a world that manifests, here more than ever, as a energized and tilted version of our own. Organizations are failing, or restructuring themselves along new and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is destroying the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "wealth is decaying, and no one knows why". Control is shifting from governments, and gathering in the halls of religious leaders, the treasuries of business empires, the control of crowds. "Some force is at work, very quietly, imperceptibly", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an city cafe. "Things we thought were firm and strong are deteriorating and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the mystery that propels The Rose Field, which picks up where its predecessor ended. This is, according to many, the author's last venture into the intricately constructed, deeply captivating world he first introduced three decades past, with the release of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography corresponds to that of this world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and reason and act like us, but are paired by daemons, beings in animal form; where the air are populated with witches and gryphons, but underneath, transports are taken and tea is drunk, and middle-aged professors carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a 12-year-old in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which the author began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still recognisably the sharp and tenacious protagonist of the prior volumes, but aged, more sorrowful, more careful, less sure. This restraint is intensified by her separation from her daemon, Pan – but it was also, ironically, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to leave in quest of that childlike part of her which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he epitomises as her "creativity"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a adventurous voyage across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with wonder and risk on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in play, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie representation of strict, administrative wickedness – is under fresh command, and asserting its power. The antagonist – our protagonist's relative, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the office of president of the Magisterium's governing body, and is intent on using his newfound power to broaden the religion's control. A key character, who rescued infant Lyra to refuge along a flooded river as an child in the prequel, is now an academic with a secondary role in spycraft: he is sent to a key location to learn more about his plans. And behind all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and costly essential oil which manifests in some way to be the cause of a societal and economic crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The oil is viewed by various factions as a marketable commodity, by alternate groups as a scientific or esoteric miracle, and by further factions – the extremist "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of evil; an affront that must be obliterated. The issue of its origins, its significance, and if it should be eliminated or preserved is escalating in importance.
Similar to His Dark Materials, our protagonist's actions, and her future, are shown to be deeply connected with the future of the world
In the previous volume, these narratives ran broadly in parallel. In the conclusion, they come together. Similar to His Dark Materials, the protagonist's movements and her fate are shown to be deeply entwined with the destiny of the universe. Her private mission to reunite with her soul and regain her creativity becomes the primary battleground in a broader conflict with an oppressive system which, as such regimes always have, is attempting to quell independence of thinking, originality and culture: all the internal, defiant ways in which people can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The story opens with the finding of a collection of strange cracks in the makeup of the planet's air: windows that appear to give on to other worlds. One such window manifests to be the source of the much debated mystical extract. The church, with Delamare at its leadership, classifies these openings as a problem to the institution's doctrine and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from rigid logic and return to instinct, however, her belief that these locations must be preserved – that what they stand for and what they offer is mysteriously vital – strengthens. "The substance, or the extract, or the vision, or the Rose Field, or whatever we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The stage for a Blakean struggle between innocence and experience is set.
Narrative Pacing and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
