Tings are falling apart in the final volume of The Dust Trilogy, the next of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that appears, in this volume especially, as a energized and slanted version of our own. Establishments are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along unfamiliar and troubling lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Power is shifting from governments, and gathering in the offices of theocrats, the vaults of conglomerates, the hands of crowds. "An element is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says merchant a trader character, keeping a observant eye on the Silk Roads from his place in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were stable and durable are weakening and failing."
Core Enigma and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and methods to fight it, is the mystery that propels the concluding book, which resumes where the previous book ended. This is, by all accounts, Pullman's final excursion into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling world he first unveiled three decades past, with the publication of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography maps on to that of this world, but whose past tacks and jibes with ours; where the individuals look and think and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, souls in animal form; where the skies are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, transports are ridden and tea is consumed, and middle-aged academics carry fancy shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a child in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the origin story with which Pullman began The Book of Dust, is now a young woman: still recognisably the spiky and determined protagonist of the prior volumes, but older, sadder, warier, less sure. This restraint is heightened by her division from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, unexpectedly, the trigger which made him desert her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
His choice to leave in quest of that innocent part of her which she may have forgotten (an trait which he symbolizes as her "vision"), and her quest to rejoin with him, were the driving forces of the prior book, which saw Lyra undertake a picaresque journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, encountering with wonder and danger on the way. But from the outset, deeper currents were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The Magisterium – the religious governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling embodiment of strict, procedural wickedness – is under fresh command, and showing its strength. Lyra's uncle – the heroine's uncle, who faults her for his family member's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of president of the authority's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his recently acquired influence to extend the religion's control. Another protagonist, who rescued infant Lyra to refuge along a flooded river as an child in the first book, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is dispatched to a key location to learn more about his plans. And underlying all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and costly botanical extract which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The substance is viewed by certain groups as a marketable product, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by further factions – the zealous "men from the mountains" – as a origin of darkness; an challenge that must be eradicated. The question of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be removed or protected is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to the original trilogy, Lyra's actions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the world
In the previous volume, these narratives ran broadly in parallel. In The Rose Field, they converge. Like the first trilogy, her actions and her destiny are shown to be inextricably entwined with the future of the realm. Her individual journey to rejoin with her soul and rediscover her imagination becomes the primary struggle in a larger conflict with an controlling government which, as such authorities typically do, is attempting to quell autonomy of reason, creativity and art: all the internal, defiant ways in which humans can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The book begins with the unveiling of a collection of strange cracks in the fabric of the Earth's atmosphere: gateways that seem to lead to other worlds. One such window appears to be the source of the fiercely disputed mystical extract. The church, with the antagonist at its head, classifies these windows as a threat to the church's beliefs and aims to eradicate them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from strict logic and revert to instinct, yet, her certainty that these places must be defended – that their meaning and their value is in some way essential – increases. "Dust, or the extract, or the imagination, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a philosophical conflict between purity and knowledge is set.
Story Tempo and Protagonist Growth
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
