Tings are unraveling in the concluding book of Pullman's latest trilogy, the second of the author's grand trilogies set in a universe that manifests, in this volume especially, as a intense and skewed version of our own. Institutions are crumbling, or reassembling themselves along novel and disturbing lines. An unseen force "is wrecking the air and the seasons"; simultaneously, "money's going bad, and no one knows why". Power is draining from governments, and pooling in the chambers of theocrats, the coffers of corporations, the control of crowds. "Something is at work, stealthily, gradually", says businessman Mustafa Bey, keeping a vigilant eye on the trade routes from his post in an Aleppo cafe. "Aspects we thought were firm and solid are deteriorating and giving way."
The Central Mystery and The Protagonist's Path
Just what that something might be, and methods to fight it, is the inquiry that propels this final volume, which picks up where the previous book concluded. This is, according to many, the author's concluding foray into the elaborately built, infinitely beguiling world he first introduced in the distant past, with the release of the first trilogy. It's a world whose terrain aligns with that of our world, but whose chronicles tacks and jibes with ours; where the people look and reason and act like us, but are joined by animal souls, essences in animal form; where the heavens are populated with enchantresses and legendary creatures, but beneath those skies, vehicles are ridden and drinks is drunk, and middle-aged scholars carry fancy shopping bags. Our heroine, whom we first encountered as a young girl in the His Dark Materials trilogy, and then revisited as a baby in the prequel, the prequel with which the author began The Book of Dust, is now a mature individual: still distinctly the sharp and persistent main character of the previous installments, but older, sadder, warier, less certain. This circumscription is intensified by her separation from her animal guide, Pan – but it was also, paradoxically, the trigger which caused him to abandon her in the first place.
Interwoven Plots
The daemon's resolve to depart in quest of that childlike part of her which she may have forgotten (an trait which he represents as her "imagination"), and her mission to reconnect with him, were the driving forces of its predecessor, which saw the protagonist undertake a picaresque journey across the continent and into the mountain region, meeting with amazement and risk on the way. But from the outset, underlying forces were in play, and malevolent elements at work. The religious council – the church's governing authority, and Pullman's masterfully eerie embodiment of austere, bureaucratic wickedness – is under recent guidance, and asserting its power. The antagonist – Lyra's relative, who faults her for his family member's death – has positioned himself into the role of president of the church's ruling assembly, and is determined on using his newfound power to broaden the church's control. Another protagonist, who rescued infant the heroine to safety along a overflowing Thames as an young boy in the prequel, is now an Oxford don with a additional duty in spycraft: he is sent to the city to discover more about Delamare's aims. And behind all of this is the enigma surrounding the scarce and costly botanical extract which appears mysteriously to be the cause of a societal and economic crisis emanating out from the region. The oil is viewed by various factions as a tradeable product, by alternate groups as a scientific or mystical phenomenon, and by further factions – the fanatical "mountain dwellers" – as a origin of darkness; an insult that must be eradicated. The question of its origins, its significance, and if it should be eliminated or safeguarded is escalating in importance.
Similar to the original trilogy, our protagonist's decisions, and her fate, are shown to be inextricably linked with the destiny of the universe
In the previous volume, these narratives ran mostly in tandem. In this final book, they converge. Similar to the original series, her actions and her destiny are unveiled to be inextricably linked with the future of the world. Her private journey to reunite with her soul and regain her imagination becomes the key conflict in a larger war with an oppressive regime which, as such authorities often attempt, is striving to stifle independence of reason, creativity and expression: all the personal, resistant ways in which people can be liberated.
Dimensional Rifts and Ideological Conflicts
The novel begins with the unveiling of a collection of curious openings in the fabric of the world's sky: portals that look to give on to alternate realities. One such opening manifests to be the point of the much debated rose oil. The Magisterium, with the antagonist at its helm, designates these portals as a problem to the church's orthodoxy and endeavors to eradicate them. As Lyra begins to move from rigid rationalism and back to feeling, yet, her belief that these sites must be protected – that what they stand for and what they offer is somehow crucial – grows. "The substance, or the extract, or the vision, or the botanical realm, or no matter what we label it," she says, "we require it." The setting for a poetic struggle between purity and knowledge is set.
Story Tempo and Personal Evolution
At a substantial length, The Rose Field|this volume|the
