Tings are unraveling in the last installment of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that seems, here more than ever, as a charged and tilted version of our own. Establishments are failing, or restructuring themselves along unfamiliar and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is ruining the air and the seasons"; concurrently, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from states, and pooling in the offices of theocrats, the treasuries of corporations, the grasp of rioters. "Some force is at work, silently, gradually", says trader Mustafa Bey, keeping a watchful eye on the ancient paths from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Elements we thought were secure and durable are deteriorating and failing."
Core Enigma and Her Quest
Exactly what that force might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that drives The Rose Field, which resumes where the previous book concluded. This is, according to many, Pullman's final excursion into the intricately constructed, infinitely beguiling world he first introduced three decades past, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a domain whose landscape aligns with that of our world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the humans appear and reason and act like us, but are joined by external spirits, souls in beast form; where the skies are teeming with witches and gryphons, but below, vehicles are ridden and drinks is consumed, and older academics carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in the prequel, the prequel with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the prickly and persistent heroine of the earlier books, but more mature, more sorrowful, more cautious, less certain. This limitation is intensified by her division from her daemon, Pantalaimon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the catalyst which made him desert her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
Pan's decision to depart in quest of that childlike part of the heroine which she appears to have shed (an trait which he symbolizes as her "creativity"), and her quest to reunite with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which saw Lyra undertake a wandering journey across Europe and into the Caucasus, meeting with marvel and risk on the way. But from the outset, profound shifts were in action, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the religious ruling body, and Pullman's masterfully eerie representation of rigid, procedural malice – is under recent guidance, and flexing its muscles. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's family member, who faults her for his sister's death – has worked himself into the office of leader of the Magisterium's High Council, and is determined on using his recently acquired power to expand the religion's control. A key character, who carried young the heroine to refuge along a overflowing river as an young boy in the first book, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is sent to the city to discover more about Delamare's plans. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the uncommon and valuable rose oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a societal and financial crisis spreading out from Central Asia. The extract is seen by some as a marketable commodity, by alternate groups as a scientific or spiritual miracle, and by others still – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be obliterated. The issue of its source, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
Similar to the first series, our protagonist's deeds, and her future, are revealed to be inseparably connected with the fate of the world
In the previous volume, these storylines ran mostly in tandem. In this final book, they converge. Similar to His Dark Materials, Lyra's movements and her destiny are revealed to be inseparably entwined with the fate of the world. Her private journey to reunite with her companion and recover her vision becomes the key struggle in a broader battle with an oppressive regime which, as such authorities typically do, is attempting to stifle autonomy of thought, originality and culture: all the personal, resistant ways in which individuals can be liberated.
Cosmic Openings and Ideological Conflicts
The book opens with the finding of a series of unusual cracks in the makeup of the world's air: portals that seem to lead to alternate realities. An example of a portal manifests to be the point of the highly contested rose oil. The authority, with Delamare at its leadership, labels these portals as a threat to the institution's orthodoxy and aims to destroy them. As our protagonist begins to turn away from rigid reason and return to feeling, however, her belief that these sites must be defended – that their significance and what they offer is somehow vital – increases. "Cosmic particles, or the extract, or the imagination, or the botanical realm, or whatever we call it," she says, "it is necessary." The scene for a poetic struggle between naivety and maturity is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Personal Evolution
At over six hundred pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
