Things are falling apart in the last installment of The Dust Trilogy, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a realm that manifests, in this volume especially, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Organizations are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; at the same time, "currency is failing, and no one knows why". Control is draining from authorities, and gathering in the chambers of theocrats, the treasuries of business empires, the control of crowds. "An element is at work, silently, gradually", says businessman a merchant figure, keeping a watchful eye on the Silk Roads from his seat in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and durable are deteriorating and collapsing."
Key Puzzle and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that force might be, and ways to oppose it, is the inquiry that drives The Rose Field, which picks up where the previous book ended. This is, reportedly, Pullman's last excursion into the elaborately built, deeply captivating universe he first introduced 30 years ago, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a realm whose geography maps on to that of this world, but whose history veers and changes with ours; where the individuals look and reason and behave like us, but are joined by external spirits, beings in animal form; where the heavens are populated with witches and mythical beasts, but underneath, vehicles are taken and tea is consumed, and older professors carry Harrods shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then saw again as a baby in the first volume, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a young woman: still clearly the prickly and persistent protagonist of the prior volumes, but aged, sadder, more careful, less certain. This restraint is intensified by her division from her soul companion, her daemon – but it was also, paradoxically, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
His choice to depart in pursuit of that childlike part of Lyra which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "vision"), and her mission to rejoin with him, were the catalysts of The Secret Commonwealth, which chronicled Lyra undertake a adventurous trek across the continent and into the Caucasus, meeting with amazement and risk on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in motion, and sinister powers at work. The Magisterium – the faith's ruling body, and the author's deliciously chilling embodiment of rigid, procedural evil – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. Lyra's uncle – Lyra's family member, who blames her for his sibling's death – has manoeuvred himself into the position of leader of the church's governing body, and is determined on using his fresh power to broaden the religion's control. Malcolm Polstead, who rescued infant Lyra to refuge along a swollen river as an young boy in La Belle Sauvage, is now an university scholar with a additional duty in espionage: he is sent to the city to learn more about his plans. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and precious essential oil which manifests mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic upheaval rippling out from that area. The extract is viewed by certain groups as a tradeable product, by alternate groups as a research-based or esoteric miracle, and by yet others – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of darkness; an insult that must be eradicated. The dilemma of where it comes from, its meaning, and if it should be eliminated or protected is escalating in importance.
As in His Dark Materials, the heroine's actions, and her future, are demonstrated to be inextricably entwined with the fate of the universe
In its predecessor, these narratives ran mostly in parallel. In the conclusion, they come together. Like His Dark Materials, her choices and her destiny are revealed to be inseparably woven with the fate of the world. Her personal mission to reunite with her companion and rediscover her creativity becomes the primary conflict in a wider war with an oppressive government which, as these systems often attempt, is seeking to stifle freedom of thinking, innovation and art: all the inner, rebellious ways in which humans can be independent.
Dimensional Rifts and Moral Battles
The novel begins with the finding of a set of strange fissures in the structure of the world's sky: gateways that look to lead to different dimensions. An example of a opening appears to be the origin of the fiercely disputed botanical substance. The church, with Delamare at its head, labels these windows as a threat to the church's doctrine and aims to destroy them. As the heroine begins to turn away from strict logic and back to instinct, yet, her conviction that these places must be protected – that their significance and what they provide is in some way vital – increases. "Dust, or the substance, or the creativity, or the Rose Field, or whatever we name it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a philosophical tussle between purity and experience is prepared.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
