Tings are falling apart in the concluding book of The Book of Dust, the second of the author's magisterial trilogies set in a world that appears, here more than ever, as a energized and skewed version of our own. Institutions are weakening, or reorganizing themselves along novel and disquieting lines. An hidden force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Authority is flowing away from governments, and pooling in the offices of religious leaders, the treasuries of conglomerates, the grasp of rioters. "Something is at work, stealthily, very subtly", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his place in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and solid are deteriorating and collapsing."
The Central Mystery and Lyra's Journey
Precisely what that element might be, and how to counteract it, is the question that animates The Rose Field, which continues where the previous book left off. This is, according to many, the author's concluding foray into the carefully crafted, endlessly enchanting realm he first introduced in the distant past, with the launch of the first trilogy. It's a world whose geography corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the people appear and reason and act like us, but are accompanied by external spirits, beings in creature form; where the air are teeming with sorceresses and gryphons, but beneath those skies, vehicles are caught and drinks is drunk, and mature academics carry luxury shopping bags. The protagonist, whom we first introduced to as a child in the first trilogy, and then revisited as a toddler in La Belle Sauvage, the prequel with which the author began this trilogy, is now a young woman: still distinctly the prickly and determined protagonist of the prior volumes, but more mature, melancholic, more cautious, more doubtful. This limitation is amplified by her split from her animal guide, her daemon – but it was also, unexpectedly, the cause which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Converging Storylines
The daemon's resolve to go off in quest of that youthful part of the heroine which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he epitomises as her "imagination"), and her quest to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of its predecessor, which followed the protagonist undertake a wandering trek across Europe and into the mountain region, encountering with amazement and risk on the way. But from the outset, deeper currents were in play, and darker forces at work. The Magisterium – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of rigid, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. The antagonist – the heroine's uncle, who holds responsible her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the role of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is intent on using his fresh power to broaden the church's dominium. Malcolm Polstead, who carried young the heroine to safety along a overflowing river as an child in the first book, is now an university scholar with a secondary role in espionage: he is assigned to Geneva to find out more about his aims. And behind all of this is the mystery surrounding the scarce and valuable essential oil which appears mysteriously to be the origin of a social and economic crisis rippling out from Central Asia. The extract is viewed by various factions as a marketable product, by others as a scientific or spiritual phenomenon, and by yet others – the zealous "mountain dwellers" – as a wellspring of malevolence; an affront that must be destroyed. The dilemma of its origins, its significance, and whether it should be destroyed or preserved is becoming urgent.
Similar to His Dark Materials, the heroine's deeds, and her destiny, are demonstrated to be deeply linked with the fate of the universe
In the previous volume, these plots ran largely in parallel. In this final book, they come together. Like the first trilogy, the protagonist's movements and her destiny are unveiled to be inextricably entwined with the future of the universe. Her individual mission to reunite with her companion and rediscover her imagination becomes the central struggle in a larger battle with an controlling government which, as these systems often attempt, is striving to stifle independence of thought, originality and expression: all the personal, defiant ways in which individuals can be independent.
Cosmic Openings and Philosophical Struggles
The novel starts with the finding of a set of unusual openings in the fabric of the Earth's air: windows that seem to give on to alternate realities. One such window appears to be the source of the fiercely disputed rose oil. The church, with Delamare at its helm, classifies these portals as a threat to the religion's beliefs and aims to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid logic and return to feeling, however, her conviction that these sites must be defended – that what they stand for and what they provide is in some way vital – grows. "The substance, or rose oil, or the imagination, or the field of roses, or whatever we label it," she says, "we need it." The setting for a Blakean tussle between naivety and maturity is prepared.
Plot Rhythm and Protagonist Growth
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
