Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of The Dust Trilogy, the second of Philip Pullman's masterful trilogies set in a realm that manifests, now more than ever, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Organizations are weakening, or restructuring themselves along new 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". Authority is flowing away from states, and gathering in the chambers of religious leaders, the vaults of corporations, the hands of mobs. "Some force is at work, stealthily, imperceptibly", says trader a merchant figure, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his seat in an city cafe. "Elements we thought were firm and strong are faltering and giving way."
Key Puzzle and The Protagonist's Path
Precisely what that something might be, and ways to oppose it, is the question that drives The Rose Field, which resumes where the previous book left off. This is, reportedly, Pullman's final foray into the carefully crafted, infinitely beguiling universe he first revealed 30 years ago, with the launch of His Dark Materials. It's a world whose landscape corresponds to that of our world, but whose chronicles diverges and shifts with ours; where the individuals look and reason and behave like us, but are accompanied by animal souls, essences in beast form; where the skies are teeming with witches and gryphons, but underneath, vehicles are taken and tea is consumed, and mature scholars carry luxury shopping bags. Lyra, whom we first introduced to as a young girl in the original trilogy, and then met once more as a infant in La Belle Sauvage, the introductory book with which Pullman began the series, is now a adult: still distinctly the prickly and tenacious protagonist of the earlier books, but aged, more sorrowful, more careful, less certain. This limitation is intensified by her separation from her soul companion, Pantalaimon – but it was also, paradoxically, the catalyst which led him to leave her in the first place.
Merging Narratives
The daemon's resolve to leave in search of that youthful part of her which she seems to have lost (an aspect which he epitomises as her "vision"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the catalysts of the prior book, which chronicled Lyra undertake a picaresque trek across Europe and into the Caucasus, meeting with marvel and danger on the way. But from the start, profound shifts were in play, and sinister powers at work. The religious council – the church's ruling body, and Pullman's deliciously chilling representation of strict, procedural malice – is under new leadership, and asserting its power. Marcel Delamare – our protagonist's uncle, who faults her for his sister's death – has manoeuvred himself into the role of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is set on using his newfound influence to extend the institution's control. Another protagonist, who carried baby the heroine to refuge along a overflowing river as an young boy in the prequel, is now an academic with a additional duty in intelligence work: he is dispatched to a key location to discover more about the antagonist's plans. And underlying all of this is the puzzle surrounding the rare and precious essential oil which manifests mysteriously to be the cause of a social and financial disturbance spreading out from Central Asia. The substance is seen by certain groups as a tradeable commodity, by different parties as a research-based or mystical wonder, and by yet others – the extremist "men from the mountains" – as a source of evil; an insult that must be destroyed. The issue of where it comes from, its significance, and whether it should be eliminated or safeguarded is coming rapidly to the fore.
As in the original trilogy, the heroine's deeds, and her future, are revealed to be inseparably entwined with the destiny of the world
In its predecessor, these storylines ran largely in tandem. In the conclusion, they converge. As in His Dark Materials, Lyra's movements and her path are unveiled to be deeply linked with the destiny of the world. Her private mission to reunite with her daemon and rediscover her vision becomes the key conflict in a broader battle with an controlling regime which, as such regimes always have, is seeking to quell independence of reason, innovation and expression: all the personal, rebellious ways in which people can be free.
Atmospheric Fissures and Philosophical Struggles
The book starts with the unveiling of a collection of strange cracks in the structure of the Earth's air: portals that look to give on to alternate realities. An example of a window manifests to be the origin of the much debated rose oil. The authority, with its leader at its leadership, labels these windows as a problem to the church's beliefs and aims to eliminate them. As Lyra begins to turn away from rigid logic and revert to intuition, yet, her certainty that these places must be protected – that their meaning and what they provide is mysteriously crucial – increases. "Cosmic particles, or rose oil, or the vision, or the field of roses, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The scene for a poetic tussle between naivety and experience is established.
Narrative Pacing and Character Development
At 640 pages, The Rose Field|this volume|the
